Animalia > Chordata > Aves > Passeriformes > Passeridae > Passer > Passer melanurus

Passer melanurus (Cape Sparrow)

Wikipedia Abstract

The Cape sparrow or mossie (Passer melanurus) is a bird of the sparrow family Passeridae found in southern Africa. A medium-sized sparrow at 14–16 centimetres (5.5–6.3 in), it has distinctive plumage including large pale head stripes. Both sexes are mostly coloured grey, brown, and chestnut, and the male has some black and white markings on its head and neck. It inhabits semi-arid savannah, cultivated areas, and towns, and ranges from the central coast of Angola to eastern South Africa and Swaziland. Three subspecies are distinguished.
View Wikipedia Record: Passer melanurus

Infraspecies

Passer melanurus damarensis
Passer melanurus melanurus
Passer melanurus vicinus

EDGE Analysis

Uniqueness Scale: Similiar (0) 
3
 Unique (100)
Uniqueness & Vulnerability Scale: Similiar & Secure (0) 
19
 Unique & Vulnerable (100)
ED Score: 6.52478
EDGE Score: 2.0182
Learn more at EDGE of Existence programme

Attributes

Adult Weight [1]  29 grams
Birth Weight [2]  2.2 grams
Diet [3]  Carnivore (Invertebrates), Granivore, Herbivore
Diet - Invertibrates [3]  10 %
Diet - Plants [3]  20 %
Diet - Seeds [3]  70 %
Forages - Understory [3]  50 %
Forages - Ground [3]  50 %
Clutch Size [5]  4
Incubation [4]  13 days
Mating Display [2]  Ground display (mostly)

Ecoregions

Protected Areas

Biodiversity Hotspots

Name Location Endemic Species Website
Cape Floristic Region South Africa No
Maputaland-Pondoland-Albany Mozambique, South Africa, Swaziland No
Succulent Karoo Namibia, South Africa No

External References

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ 1Nathan P. Myhrvold, Elita Baldridge, Benjamin Chan, Dhileep Sivam, Daniel L. Freeman, and S. K. Morgan Ernest. 2015. An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles. Ecology 96:3109
♦ 2Terje Lislevand, Jordi Figuerola, and Tamás Székely. 2007. Avian body sizes in relation to fecundity, mating system, display behavior, and resource sharing. Ecology 88:1605
♦ 3Hamish Wilman, Jonathan Belmaker, Jennifer Simpson, Carolina de la Rosa, Marcelo M. Rivadeneira, and Walter Jetz. 2014. EltonTraits 1.0: Species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals. Ecology 95:2027
♦ 4del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D.A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.
♦ 5Jetz W, Sekercioglu CH, Böhning-Gaese K (2008) The Worldwide Variation in Avian Clutch Size across Species and Space PLoS Biol 6(12): e303. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.0060303
Ecoregions provided by World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF). WildFinder: Online database of species distributions, ver. 01.06 Wildfinder Database
Biodiversity Hotspots provided by Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund
Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0