Sunangel

Sunangel
Heliangelus mavors
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Apodiformes
Family: Trochilidae
Tribe: Lesbiini
Genus: Heliangelus
Gould, 1848
Type species
Ornismya clarisse
Longuemare, 1841

The sunangels are a genus of hummingbirds, Heliangelus, found in montane South America.

Taxonomy

The genus Heliangelus was introduced in 1848 by the English ornithologist John Gould. The genus name combines the Ancient Greek ἡλιος/hēlios meaning "sun" with αγγελος/angelos meaning "angel". Gould did not specify a type species but in 1855 George Gray designated the type as Trochilus clarissae Longuemare which is Ornismya clarisse Longuemare, 1841, Longuemare's sunangel.

The genus contains the following nine species:

The Bogotá sunangel was formerly placed in this genus. It is regarded as a hybrid specimen by AviList based on a study published in 2018 by Jorge Pérez-Emán and colleagues.

References

  1. ↑ "Trochilidae". Howard & Moore Checklist Online. Trust for Avian Systematics. Retrieved 2023-08-05.
  2. ↑ Gould, John (1848). "Drafts for a new arrangement of the Trochilidae (continued)". Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London. 16 (180): 11-14 [12].
  3. ↑ Jobling, James A. "Heliangelus". The Key to Scientific Names. Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Retrieved 19 March 2026.
  4. ↑ Gray, George Robert (1855). Catalogue of the Genera and Subgenera of Birds Contained in the British Museum. London: British Museum. p. 22.
  5. ↑ Peters, James Lee, ed. (1945). Check-List of Birds of the World. Vol. 5. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 105.
  6. 1 2 AviList Core Team (2025). "AviList: The Global Avian Checklist, v2025". doi:10.2173/avilist.v2025. Retrieved 19 March 2026.
  7. ↑ Pérez-Emán, J.L.; Ferreira, J.P.; Gutiérrez-Pinto, N.; Cuervo, A.M.; Céspedes, L.N.; Witt, C.C.; Cadena, C.D. (2018). "An extinct hummingbird species that never was: a cautionary tale about sampling issues in molecular phylogenetics". Zootaxa. 4442 (3): 491–497. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.4442.3.11.