Xingu Scale-backed Antbird

The Xingu scale-backed antbird (Willisornis vidua) is a species of bird in subfamily Thamnophilinae of family Thamnophilidae, the "typical antbirds". It is endemic to Brazil. == Taxonomy and systematics == What is now the Xingu scale-backed antbird was long considered a subspecies of Willisornis poecilinotus, which at the time was called the scale-backed antbird. When the Xingu scale-backed antbird was recognized as a separate species, the reduced W. poecilinotus was renamed the common scale-backed antbird. Even before the split the species had a complicated taxonomic history, being variously assigned to genera Hypocnemis, Hylophylax, and Dichropogon before the current Willisornis was created for it. It was described and illustrated by the German ornithologist Jean Cabanis in 1847 and given the binomial name Hypocnemis poecilinotus. The species' English name refers to the Xingu River. The Xingu scale-backed antbird's taxonomy remains unsettled. The International Ornithological Committee, the South American Classification Committee of the American Ornithological Society, and the Clements taxonomy assign it two subspecies: the nominate W. v. vidua (Hellmayr, 1905) and W. v. nigrigula (Snethlage, 1914). However, BirdLife International's Handbook of the Birds of the World (HBW) treats the two taxa as separate species, respectively called the Xingu and Tapajos scale-backed antbirds.…