Chapin’s Crombec is only known from three specimens collected in the 1940s on the Lendu Plateau, north-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.
Chapin’s Crombec is the only avian taxon entirely confined to the Lendu Plateau (Prigogine 1985). This is a very rare species and has even been suggested to be possibly extinct. This species could occur in unexplored forest. This species is part of the Sylvietta genus, which diverged from their closest relatives 20.2 million years ago, during the Neogene period. Unfortunately, the Lendu Plateau has been reported to be under serious threat from encroachment from surrounding villages, including widespread and uncontrolled local logging. Only 20 hectares of the forest was seen to remain, and now all forest on the Lendu plateau could potentially be gone. No conservation actions are underway currently; therefore protection of any remaining habitats is required urgently, alongside surveys on known sites to determine the distribution and population size of this species.
- Order: Passeriformes
- Family: Macrosphenidae
- Population: Possibly extinct
- Trend: decreasing
- Size: 5cm
This species is restricted to the Lendu Plateau in The Democratic Republic of the Congo
Habitat and Ecology
This species is only known from montane vegetation on the Lendu Plateau.