456 BULLETIN 50, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



SITTA PYGMiEA PYGMiEA Vigors, 

 PIGMY NUTHATCH. 



Similar to S. pusilla but pileum and hiudneck olive instead of 

 brown, white spot on center of hindneck obsolete or indistinct, and 

 middle rectrices with basal half of inner web white. 



Adults {sexes alike) in Icite winter to early summer. — Pileum and 

 hindneck plain light grayish olive or olive-gray, the lower central 

 portion of the latter with concealed portion of feathers buffy white 

 or pale buff (exposed as a more or less conspicuous spot in worn 

 plumage); loral and postocular regions dusky or blackish; back, 

 scapulars, wing-coverts (except primary coverts), tertials, rump, upper 

 tail-coverts, and middle pair of rectrices plain deep bluish gray or 

 plumbeous, the last with a conspicuous elongated, posteriorly acum- 

 inate, patch of white, occupying basal half or more of inner web, but 

 less on outer web, on which the gray of terminal portion extends 

 marginally to the base, the contracted basal portion becoming black- 

 ish; rest of tail black, the three outermost rectrices tipped with slate 

 color (very broadly on outer one), the two outer, on each side, crossed, 

 obliquely, by a broad bar or band of white; secondaries (except 

 tertials), primaries, primary coverts, and alula brownish slate color, 

 the secondaries, innermost primaries, primary coverts, and shorter 

 feathers of alula edged with bluish gray, the longer primaries usually 

 more or less edged with white; suborbital, lower half of auricular, 

 and malar regions, chin, and upper throat wdiite or buffy white; rest 

 of under parts dull buffy white (in worn midsummer plumage) or pale' 

 dull buffy, passing into pale bluish gray on sides and flanks; maxilla 

 blackish; mandible dusky gray terminally, pale (pale bluish gray in 

 life) basally; iris brown; legs and feet dusky or dark horn color (in 

 dried skins). 



Adults in late stimmer to early vrinter. — Similar -to the plumage 

 described above, but coloration deeper (under parts mostly pro- 

 nounced buff) and pale spot on lower hindneck indistinct or obsolete 

 through concealment by olive or olive-gray tips to the feathers. 



Young. — Simihir to adults, but pileum and hindneck gray, only 

 slightly, if at all, different from color of back, and sides and flanks 

 pale buff}^ brown or brownish buff instead of gray. 



Adult m«?.^— Length (skins), 90-107.5 (95); wing, 62-69.5 (64.9); 

 tail, 31.5-37.5 (34.3); culmen, 13-15.5 (14.1); tarsus, 14-16 (14.9); 

 middle toe, 10.5-12.5 (11.5). « 



Adult female.— \^^x\^\h (skins), 88-108 (98); wing, 60-67 (63.5); tail, 



_ "Thirty-two specimens. 



