424 BULLETIN 133, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



on back, wing edgings, and sides than others seen from Tucuman 

 and Salta, and may represent a geographic race not yet described. 

 Specimens taken at Tapia include adults in molt and a female in 

 Juvenal plumage which differs from the adult in being paler brown, 

 and much paler on sides and flanks. 



These birds ranged in pairs or parties of five or six on the ground 

 among low bushes, in burns, or at the borders of fields or thickets. 

 When alarmed they flew up, with a flash of black and white from 

 the tail and a tilting flight, to perch in thickets sometimes 3 or 5 

 meters from the ground. Their light coloration made them con- 

 spicuous, but they rested quietly without apparent fear to drop 

 back after a minute or two out of sight. Their call is an insistent 

 chipping note like that of a junco. 



A male, taken April 7, had the maxilla dark mouse gray ; cutting 

 edge of maxilla and mandible mustard yellow ; iris natal brown ; 

 tarsus and toes neutral • gray. A juvenile individual had the bill 

 dull black with the cutting edges faintly marked with dull yellow. 



AIMOPHILA STRIGICEPS DABBENEI (Hellinayr) 



Zonotrichia strigicej)S dahbenei HELr^cAYR, Verb. Ornith. Ges. Bayern, vol. 

 11, 1912, p. 190. (Tapia, Tucuman.) 



Two specimens were taken at Tapia, Tucuman, April 10, 1921, one 

 of which was prepared as a skeleton. Doctor Hellmayr in describ- 

 ing the present form differentiated it from strigice'ps (type-locality 

 Santa Fe) on larger size, stronger bill, and darker brown stripes on 

 the side of the head. The specimens taken at Tapia are the only 

 ones that I have seen. The skin, an adult male, has the following 

 measurements: Wing, 72.6; tail, 78.3; culmen from base, 14; tarsus, 

 22 mm. 



The generic relationships of this species have been in doubt. The 

 bird belongs without question in the supergeneric group entitled the 

 Zonotrichiae by Mr. Eidgway,-^ in which genera, in most cases, are 

 closely related. It is certainly not a Zonotnchia, in which Hellmayr 

 placed it provisionally, as it has the tail longer than the wing, a 

 different wing formula and a heavier bill, reasons that likewise 

 prevent its allocation in Brachyspisa. In general appearance, wing, 

 tail, and bill, it is closely similar to Aimophila rufescens, the type of 

 Aimopliila Swainson, differing from that bird structurally mainly 

 in its smaller more delicate feet. Although, as Mr. Ridgway has 

 indicated, Aimophila is a somewhat heterogeneous group, still it may 

 not be divided, and strigiceps may be placed in it without difficulty, 

 as has been done by Salvadori and Dabbene and others. As proof of 

 this the species runs readily to the genus Aimojjhila in Mr. Ridg- 

 way's key to the finches of North and Middle America. 



23 Birds North and Middle America, vol. 1, 1901, p. 28. 



