Blue-capped Ifrita

SCI Name:  Ifrita kowaldi
Protonym:  Todopsis kowaldi AnnualRep.Brit.NewGuinea(1888-1889) App.G p.59
Taxonomy:  Passeriformes / Ifritidae / Ifrita
Taxonomy Code:  bucifr1
Type Locality:  British New Guinea; type from Owen Stanley Mountains, fide Mayr, 1941, List New Guinea Birds, p. 113.
Author:  De Vis
Publish Year:  1890
IUCN Status:  Least Concern

DEFINITIONS

IFRITA
(Ifritidae; Ϯ Blue-capped Ifrit I. kowaldi) Arabic myth. ‘ifrīt  spirit, djinn; "A beautiful little bird of brownish plumage but with the head adorned with a blue crown was received in England, and, mystified by the presence of the blue crown, the authorities introduced a new genus for it, though otherwise such a proposal was anathema to them. The name selected was Ifrita, from the Arabic Ifrit, a demon, not because it was in any sense devilish, but because it had puzzled through the blue garlanded head." (Iredale 1956); "IFRITA, gen. nov.  Of doubtful affinities, but probably near Amalocichla and Cinclosoma, agreeing with the former [sic] genus in the form of the bill, but differing in its softer body-plumage, longer toes, softer tail and wings, and less graduated tail. Agreeing with Amalocichla in its soft plumage, but differing totally by the less compressed, shorter, and stouter bill. The wings are evidently of the usual rounded form of Timeliidæ, but cannot be described, being in moult. The tail is incomplete, but seems to be almost square; bill a little shorter than the head; the strong tarsus about half as long as the tail.  IFRITA CORONATA, sp. n." (Rothschild 1898); "Ifrita Rothschild, 1898, Bull. Brit. Orn. Cl., 7, p. 53. Type, by monotypy, Ifrita coronata Rothschild [= Todopsis kowaldi De Vis]." (Deignan in Peters 1964, X, 239). The affinities of the Blue-capped or Blue-wreathed Ifrit are as obscure today as they were over one hundred and twenty years ago. Its diet of noxious insects renders the bird unpalatable, and thus it is scorned by the locals (see Pitohui).

kowaldi
Karl Adolf (later Charles Adolph) Kowald (d. 1896) German/Australian naturalist, patrol officer, interpreter and government agent in British New Guinea, botanist, horticulturalist, collector (Martin Schneider and Björn Bergenholtz in litt.) (Ifrita).

SUBSPECIES

Blue-capped Ifrita (brunnea)
SCI Name: Ifrita kowaldi brunnea
brunnea
Mod. L. brunneus  brown  < Med. L. brunius  brown.

Blue-capped Ifrita (kowaldi)
SCI Name: Ifrita kowaldi kowaldi
kowaldi
Karl Adolf (later Charles Adolph) Kowald (d. 1896) German/Australian naturalist, patrol officer, interpreter and government agent in British New Guinea, botanist, horticulturalist, collector (Martin Schneider and Björn Bergenholtz in litt.) (Ifrita).