South-Western Madagascar is a surreal place – much more arid than most people typically imagine Madagascar, and filled with bizzare Octopus trees adorned with dancing sifaka lemurs. The predominant vegetation in the area is called spiny forest – and for good reason, as one soon finds out when chasing after disappearing Long-tailed Ground Rollers . The first of the two warblers featured here is the Thamnornis Thamnornis chloropetoides. This species is now part of the motley assemblage making up the newly-erected Malagasy family Bernieridae, along with such oddities as the White-throated Oxylabes, Long-billed Bernieria, Cryptic Warbler, Wedge-tailed Jery, Spectacled Tetraka and Madagascan Yellowbrow. The second warbler’s taxonomy is a bit more straighforward. It is a Subdesert Brush Warbler Nesillas lantzi. It shares this genus with 4 extant and 1 extinct warblers, all of which are endemic to Indian Ocean islands.
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