Black-backed cisticola explained

The black-backed cisticola or black-necked cisticola (Cisticola eximius) is a species of passerine bird in the family Cisticolidae.It is found in Burkina Faso, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ivory Coast, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Mali, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, and Uganda.Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical dry lowland grassland and subtropical or tropical seasonally wet or flooded lowland grassland.

Taxonomy

The black-backed cisticola was described by the German explorer and ornithologist Theodor von Heuglin in 1869 from a specimen collected near the Bahr el Ghazal River in South Sudan. He coined the binomial name Drymoeca eximia.^[1] The specific epithet eximius is the Latin for "select" or "distinguished".^[2] The species is now placed in the genus Cisticola which was erected by the German naturalist Johann Jakob Kaup in 1829.^[3]

Three subspecies are recognised:^[4]

• C. e. occidens Lynes, 1930 – south Senegal to Nigeria
• C. e. winneba Lynes, 1931 – south Ghana
• C. e. eximius (Heuglin, 1869) – Congo and Central African Republic to Eritrea, Ethiopia, west Kenya and north Tanzania

Notes and References

1. Heuglin . M. Theodor von . Theodor von Heuglin . 1869 . The Malurinae of north-eastern Africa . Ibis . 5 . Series 2 . 17 . 79-107 [106-107 and Fig. 1] . 10.1111/j.1474-919X.1869.tb07096.x .
2. Web site: Jobling . J.A. . 2019 . Key to Scientific Names in Ornithology . del Hoyo . J. . Elliott . A. . Sargatal . J. . Christie . D.A. . de Juana . E. . Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive . Lynx Edicions . 8 January 2019 .
3. Book: Kaup, Johann Jakob . Johann Jakob Kaup . 1829 . Skizzirte Entwickelungs-Geschichte und natürliches System der europäischen Thierwelt . c. 1 . German . Darmstadt . Carl Wilhelm Leske . 119 .
4. Web site: Gill . Frank . Frank Gill (ornithologist) . Donsker . David . 2019 . Grassbirds, Donacobius, Malagasy warblers, cisticolas & allies . World Bird List Version 8.2 . International Ornithologists' Union . 7 January 2019 .