Palm crow

The palm crow is a relatively small corvid that occurs mostly on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola. It was formerly quite frequent on Cuba but has become severely reduced in number. This subspecies is slightly smaller and is usually separated as a subspecies called Corvus palmarum minutus. Both subspecies are usually now given the respective common names of Hispaniolan palm crow and Cuban palm crow to distinguish them.

It appears to be closely related to the fish crow (C. ossifragus) of the East Coast of the United States and also two smaller species, the Tamaulipas crow (C. imparatus) and Sinaloan crow (C. sinaloae) of Mexico and forms a species group with them.

The Dominican local name for the palm crow is cao, which is onomatopoeic of the simple and repetitive call of this bird. There it is locally common, mainly in mountain pine forests and also around the area of Lake Enriquillo.