Chaetocercus

Chaetocercus
File:Gorgeted Woodstar female JCB.jpg
Female gorgeted woodstar (Chaetocercus heliodor)
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Clade:	Strisores
Order:	Apodiformes
Family:	Trochilidae
Tribe:	Mellisugini
Genus:	Chaetocercus G.R. Gray, 1855
Type species
Ornismya jourdanii (rufous-shafted woodstar) Bourcier, 1839
Synonyms
Acestrura Gould, 1861

Chaetocercus is a genus of hummingbirds in the family Trochilidae.

Taxonomy

The genus Chaetocercus was introduced in 1855 by the English zoologist George Robert Gray with the rufous-shafted woodstar as the type species. The name is a combination of the Ancient Greek words khaitē, meaning "hair" and kerkos, meaning "tail".

The genus contains six species:

Genus Chaetocercus – G.R. Gray, 1855 – six species

Common name	Scientific name and subspecies	Range	Size and ecology	IUCN status and estimated population
White-bellied woodstar File:Chaetocercus mulsant (33951670388).jpg Male {{{image2-alt}}} Female	Chaetocercus mulsant (Bourcier, 1843)	Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru Map of range	Size: Habitat: Diet:	LC
Little woodstar File:Chaetocercus bombus 114213470.jpg Male {{{image2-alt}}} Female	Chaetocercus bombus Gould, 1871	Colombia, Ecuador and Peru Map of range	Size: Habitat: Diet:	NT
Gorgeted woodstar File:Gorgeted Woodstar, Male.jpg Male {{{image2-alt}}} Female	Chaetocercus heliodor (Bourcier, 1840) Two subspecies C. h. heliodor C. h. cleavesi	Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela Map of range	Size: Habitat: Diet:	LC
Santa Marta woodstar File:Chaetocercus astreans 180500334.jpg Male {{{image2-alt}}} Female	Chaetocercus astreans (Bangs, 1899)	Colombia Map of range	Size: Habitat: Diet:	LC
Esmeraldas woodstar File:Chaetocercus berlepschi 35533145.jpg	Chaetocercus berlepschi (Simon, 1889)	Ecuador Map of range	Size: Habitat: Diet:	VU
Rufous-shafted woodstar	Chaetocercus jourdanii (Bourcier, 1839) Three subspecies C. j. andinus Phelps, WH & Phelps, WH Jr, 1949 C. j. rosae (Bourcier & Mulsant, 1846) C. j. jourdanii (Bourcier, 1839)	Colombia, Trinidad and Tobago, and Venezuela. Map of range	Size: Habitat: Diet:	LC

All these species, except for the rufous-shafted woodstar, were formerly placed in the genus Acestrura. In 1999 Karl-Ludwig Schuchmann remarked in the Handbook of the Birds of the World that for the species placed in Acestrura: "...no evidence in external morphology justifies treatment in a genus separate from C. jourdanii".