Tenerife blue chaffinch Tenerife blue chaffinch The Tenerife blue chaffinch ("Fringilla teydea") is a species of passerine bird in the finch family Fringillidae. It is endemic to Tenerife in Spain's Canary Islands. This bird is the natural symbol of this island, together with the Canary Islands dragon tree. Until 2015 the species "Fringilla teydea" was classified in two subspecies: "Fringilla teydea polatzeki" from Gran Canaria and "Fringilla teydea teydea" from Tenerife. However, a study published in March 2016 showed that a classification as different species, "Fringilla polatzeki" and "Fringilla teydea", is justified. Blue chaffinches resemble common chaffinches, but they are noticeably larger, and
Gallotia 2010). Finally, the clade that colonized the younger western islands was likely to have originated from Lanzarote/Fuerteventura. This western island clade diverged into two groups, all of which colonized Tenerife, La Palma, La Gomera and El Hierro, leading to 1) a medium-bodied (e.g., "G. caesaris" from El Hierro) and 2) a large bodied "giant" species (e.g., "G. simonyi" from El Hierro) on each of these islands (note that "G. intermedia" from Tenerife belongs to the "giant" group, but present-day individuals are not that large). The giant species now exist, at best, in small relict populations, while "G. auritae" may be