The male of this common bird in Suriname (lenght 10 cm) is
shiny black with some white in its wings. The female and young
are brown with stripes on their breast. The males have a peculiar
way of dancing: they jump up out of the grass, fly straight up
and wisthle 'srio' and then come back to the place where they
started. In the photograph below the male is captured at the
highest point in its one-foot jump from the barbed wire.
You can find them on the same places as the variable and other
seedeaters, places with high grasses. On the grassfields around
the university buildings in Paramaribo, this was the most common
bird (together with the grounddoves), when I worked there. There
were always dozens of birds around seeking for seeds. I made a video of a jumping and
singing male blue-black grassquit, Tiziu in Paramaribo.
Photo above made by J.S. Dunning in Suriname, below by J.H. Ribot in Paramaribo, first of a bird sitting in the wind and the second one of a bird jumping, as in the video. The three photos of a nest of the Blue-black Grassquit first with eggs than the same nest with young and the photo of the young male were made by Foek Chin Joe in Paramaribo-Tourtonne (in August 2007 for the nest).
Each small square indicates the observation of at least one (group) of these birds, the medium ones at least 4 observations on different days and the largest ones 10 or more. The color of each square indicates: blue for coastal area, yellow for savanna and red for rainforest. Sometimes dozens of grassquits are seen, for instance on the grasslands around the university buildings.
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