BREWSTER: BIRDS OF THE CAPE REGION, LOWER CALIFORXI.V. 115 



deep velvety often glossed with violet or blue; the metallic green of the throat, 

 clear and brilliant; the cinnamon rufous of the under parts, rich and pure. 

 The spring birds (March, April, and May), are uniformly much duller and 

 paler, the green of the back being much tinged with ashy or rusty, and the 

 black of the head w^th brown, while the green of the throat is muddy in tone 

 and but slightly iridescent. One bird (No. 17,031, Triunfo, April 11, 1887) 

 has the black of the head confined to the auriculars, and the green of the 

 throat to a few central spots, the rest of the under parts being dull cinnamon 

 rufous, and the entire U]>per parts dull green with most of the feathers tipped 

 ■with rusty cinnamon. This specimen is evidently immature and probably in 

 Juvenal plumage. The fact that it is the only male in the entire series which 

 does not have the whole throat greenish and the forehead, cheeks, and lores 

 black or dark brownish, would seem to indicate that young bird^ acquire the 

 fully adult plumage with their first complete moult. 



Baird, Brewer, and Ridgway describe and figure the male of this species as 

 having " a distinct white stripe from bill, through and behind the eye." Coues 

 says ^ that this stripe passes " through the eye." Elliot implies that it is situ- 

 ated as in B. leucotis, that is, " above and behind the eye." Ridgway states ^ 

 that it is " behind eye." In all of the seventy males in my series it starts 

 immediately above the middle of the eye, and curving down behind it extends 

 straight backward along the side of the head f(ir about half an inch, im- 

 pinging closely on the eye both above and behind the upper eyelid. 



Another discrepancy in the descriptions just referred to is in respect to the 

 color of the bill. Baird, Brewer, and Ridgway say "whole upper mandible 

 apparently dusky; base of lower, red;" Coues, "flesh-colored, Idack tipped ;" 

 Elliot, " red, tip black." In my dried specimens the basal half to three- 

 fourths of the upper mandible and the basal three-fourths to seven-eighths of 

 the lower mandible are flesh-colored, the remainder of both mandibles being 

 dark brown. 



Few.ales. As with the males, the spring specimens are much paler and duller 

 than the summer ones. Some of the latter have the top and sides of head, the 

 upper tail coverts, and the middle pair of tail feathers strongly tinged with 

 cinnamon. The superciliary stripe is often nearly pure white in early •spring 

 birds. Ridgway says ^ that the throat of the female is either " with or without 

 green spots." In my series of forty-one females not one shows the slightest 

 trace of green spotting on the throat. 



This Hummingbird is peculiar to Lower California, but it is not strictly con- 

 fined to the Cape Region, for Mr. Frazar found it common at a point about one 

 hundred and fifty miles north of La Paz among the mountains opposite C!ar- 

 men Island in latitude 26°, and Mr. Bryant has traced its extension still farther 

 northward to about latitude 29°. It seems to be most abundant, however, in 



1 Key N. Amer. Birds, 4th ed., 1894, 460. 



2 Man. N. Amer. Birds, 1887, 318. 

 8 Loc. cit. 



