l66 BIRDS OF THE REPUBLIC OF PANAMA PART 3 



to several twigs in a fork in the branch so that the cup appeared 

 partly suspended. Three days later the nest walls were thicker but 

 still the structure was not complete. Time available at the locality 

 did not allow further examination. 



A nest with a set of two eggs (U.S. National Museum no. 41393) 

 of this subspecies was collected by AI. A. Carriker, Jr., at Nuqui, 

 Choco, on the northwestern coast of Colombia, March 5, 1951. 

 The nest is a thin-walled cup, of elongated, mosslike fibers strength- 

 ened by a thin inner lining of slender filaments that resemble aerial 

 rootlets of some of the epiphytes. The upper margins of these ma- 

 terials are wrapped securely around two sides of a thin-branched 

 fork so that the nest is suspended. The walls, while firm and strong, 

 are so thin that details of form of anything inside would be 

 visible from below. The nest is approximately 70 mm in diameter 

 by 45 mm in depth. The two eggs are white, with a very faint tint 

 of bufif, spotted heavily on the larger end with dark brown, that in 

 places shows as lilac-gray where the darker color was overlaid with 

 shell during its formation. Tiny dots and occasional slightly larger 

 marks are thinly scattered over the rest of the surface. In form one 

 of the eggs is oval, the other is broader, almost subelliptical. They 

 measure 16.9x12.7 and 17.3x12.7 mm. Stone (Proc. Acad. Nat. 

 Sci. Philadelphia, vol. 70, 1918, p. 260) gives a description of a nest 

 with eggs found by Jewel on the Rio Siri, Canal Zone, March 31, 

 1912. "Nest pensile at end of a slender branch . . . made of fine 

 grasses with curtain of green moss. . . . Eggs two . . . grayish 

 white, heavily speckled, mottled and washed with shades of cinnamon- 

 brown, with a heavier wreath around the larger end." The egg 

 measurements given, transposed to the metric system, are 17.2x12.7 

 and 17.5 X 13.4 mm. 



The account by Sclater and Salvin (Proc. Zool. Soc. London, 

 1879, p. 525) of an egg attributed to M. surinamensis , collected by 

 Salmon at Remedies in Antioquia, which is described as "white" with 

 measurements of 20.3x16.5 mm, must refer to some other species. 

 The inclusion by Salvin and Godman (Biol. Centr.-Amer., Aves, 

 vol. 2, 1892, p. 209) of "Veraguas (Arce)" in the range also is un- 

 certain and may be leased on a specimen from the Salvin-Godman 

 collection in the British Museum labeled "Veragua (Arce)." Arce 

 collected in the range of this bird at Chepo; or possibly at Calovevora 

 on the Caribbean slope of northern Veraguas. 



The subspecies pacifica ranges beyond Panama in South America 

 to the Sinu and lower Magdalena Valleys in Colombia, and south 

 along the Pacific Coast to western Ecuador. 



