308 BIRDS OF THE REPUBLIC OF PANAMA — PART 3 



Finca Lerida at about 1600 meters above Boquete. 



There is little recorded concerning this bird in Panama, except that 

 it is a forest inhabitant. In Costa Rica, where it is known as the 

 Pdjaro Danta (tapir bird) or Pavoncillo (little peacock), it is found 

 on the Caribbean slope, ranging to the higher levels in the mountains. 

 Slud (Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., vol. 128, 1964, p. 233) says that 

 it moves lower down after nesting. Carriker (Ann. Carnegie Mus., 

 vol. 6, 1910, p. 661) found a pair near sea level on the Rio Sixaola, 

 and collected the female. 



Charles Cordier (Anim. King., vol. 46, 1943, pp. 1-10), who 

 captured two males and a female alive for the New York Zoological 

 Society, in observations on the upper Rio San Carlos in northern 

 Costa Rica in April and May 1942, found a group of males in daily 

 display. Each had one to three perches for this purpose, some within 

 5 meters of the ground, others higher. As the birds move about, 

 one may hold several thin twigs in its bill. In calling, the male "fills 

 out his airsack, which is bright scarlet, to the size of a big tomato, 

 the feather-tipped, fleshy wattle attached to the airsack becoming 

 greatly extended and hanging down 3 or 4 inches [75 to 100 milli- 

 meters]. When the airsack is distended the boom is produced. Then 

 he suddenly throws his head violently back, far back, and quickly 

 forward again, expelling the air with a swishing sound closely re- 

 sembling the spitting of a big cat. He immediately fills his airsack 

 again and lets forth another boom, but now he expels the air without 

 going through any contortion or sound." Cordier saw no eggs or 

 young, but three nests shown to him as of this bird "resembled over- 

 size thrush nests. All were placed 4 to 6 feet from the ground between 

 the trunk of a medium-sized tree and a branch." The egg is as yet 

 unknown. 



Sick (Journ. f. Orn., 1954, pp. 240-243) described the nest of the 

 related Cephalop terns ornatus in Brazil as located in a tree 12 meters 

 above the ground. It was made of twigs so loosely placed that when 

 an egg was laid it was visible through the bottom of the nest from the 

 ground. The egg was described as khaki-brown with dark brown 

 and lilac markings, round at the ends of the egg, longer in the 

 middle, fused to cover most of the larger end. The egg measured 

 56.0x35.8 mm. As shown in a photograph that accompanies the 

 account, it is somewhat pointed subelliptical in form. 



The present species has been listed as a geographic race of 

 Cephalopterus ornatus of South America which in the male and fe- 

 male has the throat and foreneck entirely feathered. In the Central 



