Biology:Cypsiurus

Cypsiurus is a genus of birds in the swift family Apodidae. It includes three species, which were formerly considered to be conspecific due to their similarity.

Species

Genus Cypsiurus – Lesson, 1843 – three species

Common name	Scientific name and subspecies	Range	IUCN status and estimated population
Asian palm swift	Cypsiurus balasiensis (Gray, 1829) Four subspecies C. b. balasiensis (Gray, 1829) C. b. bartelsorum Brooke, 1972 C. b. infumatus (Sclater, 1866) C. b. pallidior (McGregor, 1905)	Widespread throughout Asia	Population unknown
African palm swift	Cypsiurus parvus (Lichtenstein, 1823) Six subspecies C. p. brachypterus (Reichenow, 1903) C. p. celer Clancey, 1983 C. p. hyphaenes Brooke, 1972 C. p. laemostigma (Reichenow, 1905) C. p. myochrous (Reichenow, 1886) C. p. parvus (Lichtenstein, 1823)	Widespread throughout Africa	Population unknown
Malagasy palm swift	Cypsiurus gracilis (Sharpe, 1871) Two subspecies C. g. gracilis (Sharpe, 1871) C. g. griveaudi Benson, 1960	Madagascar and the Comoros	Population unknown

Description

These swifts spend most of their lives in the air, living on flying insects. Palm swifts often feed near the ground, and they drink on the wing.

References

• Barlow, Wacher and Disley, Birds of The Gambia ISBN 1-873403-32-1
• Chantler and Driessens, Swifts ISBN 1-873403-83-6
• Grimmett, Inskipp and Inskipp, Birds of India ISBN 0-691-04910-6

Template:Strisores Wikidata ☰ Q134854 entry