A Zitting Cisticola, Cisticola juncidis, aka Streaked Fantail Warbler, fka Fan-tailed Warbler, perched on a thistle, or thistle-like plant, near Vejer de la Frontiera, Andalucía.
This was one of the very first ‘new’ birds I saw when I first went on a birding trip to Mallorca many years ago, when it was called Fan-tailed Warbler. However, not only is there a totally different species called Fan-tailed Warbler in America, but also this species has been renamed to reflect its place in the Cisticola family.
Cisticolas are a ‘difficult’ family, not just because most people, including me, aren’t quite sure if the word should be pronounced Cis-TIH-co-la or Cis-ti-COH-la, but also because many of the species look very similar, even though divided into two groups, streaked and unstreaked. So several of them are named after the sounds they make, e.g. Winding (as in winding up a clock, not ‘winding’ a baby), Croaking, Piping, Siffling, Trilling, Bubbling etc. The Zitting Cisticola literally flies around calling, “Zit … Zit …Zit…”
The Zitting Cisticola is the only member of the family to be found in Europe. In fact, it has a very wide distribution from southern Europe through parts of Africa and southern Asia and into northern Australia.
This photo is copyright © Liz Leyden, all rights reserved.
A larger crop of this photo of a Zitting Cisticola is available to license as a stock photo from my portfolio at iStock.
