The Story
I photographed this Scrub Tanager (Stilpnia vitriolina) at the Jardín Botánico del Quindío in Calarcá, Quindío, Colombia, on July 17, 2018. Its natural habitats include moist montane forest, high-elevation shrubland and heavily degraded former forest. It lives along all three Andean ranges of western Colombia and in the inter-Andean valleys of northern Ecuador, mainly between 500 and 2,500 meters. The garden’s butterfly house is a large open-air vivarium, home to more than 30 butterfly species native to Colombia. IUCN lists the Scrub Tanager as Least Concern, with a stable population.
I made this frame with a Pentax K-1 and the HD Pentax-D FA 150-450mm f/4.5-5.6, at 1/400 sec, f/5.6, ISO 16000. The regional environmental agency, the CRQ, has also entrusted the garden with eight hectares of natural forest in the Barbas Bremen forest reserve, near Filandia and Circasia.
©2018 Adam Rainoff Photographer
The bird
The Scrub Tanager (Stilpnia vitriolina) belongs to the family Thraupidae (Tanagers and Allies) in the eBird/Clements taxonomy.
Source: eBird.org (opens in a new tab)
Conservation
Least Concern on the IUCN Red List (assessment published 2024), with the population trend listed as stable. Source: IUCN Red List