Cinnamon Warbling-Finch

The cinnamon warbling finch is a medium-sized member of the genus Poospiza. It is about 13 cm (5.1 in) long and weighs about 10 to 15 g (0.35 to 0.53 oz). The species is sexually dimorphic but not dramatically so. Adult males have a mostly slate gray head with a pale cinnamon supercilium that widens behind the eye and a cinnamon crescent below the eye. Their upperparts are mostly grayish with a chestnut patch in the center of the back; the lower back and rump are paler than the upper back. Their outermost rectrices are white and the rest brownish gray. Their wing coverts are gray or brownish gray with white tips on the greater and median coverts that show as two large wing bars. Their chin and upper throat are cinnamon that becomes rufous on the lower breast and flanks and becomes cinnamon again on the belly. Adult females are paler than males, especially on their breast and flanks, and the chestnut patch on their back is paler and smaller than the male's. Both sexes have a dark brown iris, a black maxilla, a silver black mandible, and blackish legs. Juveniles generally resemble adult females but with a gray-streaked whitish breast and belly. The cinnamon warbling finch is most similar to the rusty-browed warbling finch (P. erythrophryus), which shares the extreme northern portion of the former's non-breeding range. …

The cinnamon warbling finch is almost entirely endemic to Argentina. Its overall range there extends from the northwest in Salta Province south to northern Río Negro and western Buenos Aires provinces and as far east as southern Entre Ríos and northern Buenos Aires provinces on the Uruguayan border. It has also been reported in southwestern Uruguay's Colonia Department; some authors have questioned those records but the South American Classification Committee has accepted the species there as a vagrant though not as a regular migrant. During the breeding season the cinnamon warbling finch primarily inhabits arid woodlands and scrublands in the Monte Desert and taller scrublands in ravines in the Andean foothills. In the Monte Desert it favors mesquite (Prosopis flexuosa) woodlands. In the non-breeding season it inhabits moister woodlands and scrublands. In elevation it ranges from near sea level to 1,000 m (3,300 ft).

The cinnamon warbling finch feeds primarily on grass seeds, with smaller amounts of arthropods and fruits in its diet. It forages both on the ground and while clinging to grass stalks. It takes fruit and arthropods from trees and shrubs. It is usually single or in pairs during the breeding season and often in mixed-species flocks in the non-breeding season.