The white-winged black tit (Melaniparus leucomelas) is a passerine bird in the tit family Paridae. It is also known as the white-winged tit, dark-eyed black tit or northern black tit.Gosler, A. & Clement, P. (2019). "Dark-eyed Black Tit (Melaniparus leucomelas)". In: del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., Sargatal, J., Christie, D. A. & de Juana, E. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. Retrieved 26 November 2019. The species was first described by Eduard Rüppell in 1840.
Description It is mainly black with a white wing patch, but differs from the more northern white-shouldered tit (Melaniparus guineensis) with which it sometimes considered conspecific in that it has a dark eye.
Range and races It is found in central Africa, from Angola in the west to Ethiopia in the east. There are two races: M. l. leucomelas Rüppell, 1840 – Ethiopia, Eritrea, Sudan and South Sudan M. l. insignis Cabanis, 1880 – African equator to southern subtropics
Taxonomy The white-winged black tit was formerly one of the many species in the genus Parus but was moved to Melaniparus after a molecular phylogenetic analysis published in 2013 showed that the members of the new genus formed a distinct clade.
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Sound recordings, xeno-canto