The flame-colored tanager (Piranga bidentata), formerly known as the stripe-backed tanager, is a medium-sized American songbird in the family Cardinalidae, the cardinals or cardinal grosbeaks. It is found from Mexico throughout Central America to northern Panama and occasionally in the United States; four subspecies are recognized. The flame-colored tanager is long, the male having predominantly red-orange while the female is more yellowish orange. Taxonomy and systematics English naturalist William John Swainson described the flame-colored tanager in 1827 from material collected by William Bullock and his son from a specimen from Temascaltepec in Mexico. French ornithologist Frédéric de Lafresnaye described Piranga sanguinolenta as a separate species in 1839, though the two were generally regarded as conspecific by the end of the 19th century. A 2019 genetic study using mitochondrial DNA showed that the flame-colored tanager was the sister taxon of the western tanager (P. ludoviciana). The flame-colored tanager and the other species of genus Piranga were originally placed in the family Thraupidae, the "true" tanagers. Since approximately 2008 they have been placed in their current family. The flame-colored tanager has four recognized subspecies, the nominate Piranga bidentata bidentata, P. b. flammea, P. b. sanguinolenta, and P. b. citrea. Description The flame-colored tanager is long. The nominate weighs and P. b. flammea . The nominate male's head and underparts are red-orange becoming yellower towards the vent area. It has a brown patch below the eye from the bill to behind the eye. The mantle and back are dusky orange with an olive tint; the rump is paler with little or no streaking. The female has a similar pattern but its head and underparts are yellow and the back is olive with black streaks. The male P. b. flammea is a paler red-orange than the nominate. P. b. sanguinolenta is also similar to the nominate but the head and underparts are bright red to orange-red. P. b. citrea is paler and more orange below compared to the nominate. Distribution and habitat The subspecies of flame-colored tanager are found thus: P. b. bidentata, principally from western Mexico's Sonora and Chihuahua states south to Guerrero and east to near Mexico City. It occasionally reaches southern Arizona and less frequently western Texas. P. b. flammea, Mexico's Nayarit state and Islas Marías P. b. sanguinolenta, from eastern Mexico's Nuevo León and Tamaulipas states south through Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador into north central Nicaragua P. b. citrea,