BIRI>S OF ARGENTINA, PARAGUAY, URUGUAY, AND CHILE 237 

 LEPIDOCOLAPTES ANGUSTIROSTRIS PRAEDATUS (Cherrie) 



Picolaptes angustirostris praedatus Cherrie, Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., 

 vol. 25, May 20, 3916, p. 187. (Concepcion del Uruguay, Entre Rios, 

 Argentina. ) 



The prebeiit subspecies, seemingly differentiated from the typical 

 form by greater size, longer bill, and the extension of the stripes on 

 head and hind neck down to the upper back, is the southernmost 

 representative of the species, as it ranges through the scanty wooded 

 areas of the northern pampas, in western Uruguay, Buenos Aires, 

 and in the band of forest that crosses the Territory of Pampa in 

 the vicinity of Victorica. 



There is in the United States National Museum an old specimen 

 taken near Buenos Aires by the Page expedition, while I secured 

 two females near Victorica, Pampa, on December 24 and 27, 1920, 

 and an immature male at Rio Negro, Uruguay, on February 15, 

 1921. If the skin from Buenos Aires be considered as typical of 

 the form, a logical procedure, as the type came from Concepcion, 

 in similar country 300 kilometers to the northward, it is found that 

 the skins from Victorica have a shorter wing, are grayer, and that 

 one has a much longer bill. (The mandibles in the second skin 

 from Victorica are imperfect.) The last are placed with praedatus 

 on the basis of size of bill, and because they agree with praedatus 

 in the extension of the head and neck streaks over the upper back. 

 The specimen from Eio Negro, Uruguay, is only recently from the 

 nest, and its bill is short and undeveloped. It is darker above, more 

 blackish on the head, and more heavily streaked below than the 

 others. Pertinent measurements, in millimeters, of these four skins 

 are as follows : 



Near Victorica, Pampa, several wood hewers of the present form 

 were recorded on December 24 and 27, 1920, in the Ioav, open forest 

 of calden, algarroba, and similar trees characteristic of the region. 

 The dry atmosphere had a tendency to make feathers hard and 

 brittle so that the tails in all the Lepidocola'ptes seen were worn 

 short and blunt from abrasion on the rough-barked trees. Near 

 Rio Negro, Uruguay, on February 15, 1921, 1 found a brood of fully- 

 grown j^oung in low woods, clambering actively about with low, 

 rather rapid, whistled notes, with all of the mannerisms of adults. 



