FAMILY TR0CHIL1DAE 3O/ 



light metallic green, in some this extending across the breast almost to 

 the median line. 



Immature male, at first like the female, but with wing coverts more 

 greenish blue; in a succeeding plumage like adult, but duller above, 

 without the crown patch and with the breast and abdomen dusky gray 

 spotted irregularly with dark blue, tipped lightly with metallic green. 



These are forest birds that range regularly in open areas where they 

 feed at flowers. Males in the two races found in the Republic are 

 easily distinguished by the color of the crown, but females are closely 

 similar. The latter sex resembles that of the sapphire-throated hum- 

 mingbird but may be identified in life by the wholly black bill, and 

 the grayish white lower surface. It should be noted, however, that 

 immature individuals of the present species when first on the wing 

 may have the base of the mandible light-colored, a tint that disappears 

 with maturity. 



This green-throated, bluish purple-breasted group of hummingbirds 

 is widely spread from southern Mexico through Central America 

 and much of northern and central South America. Variation in mark- 

 ings is found mainly in the crown color in males. Those with this area 

 deep blue or brilliant green range from southern Central America 

 through most of Colombia west of the Amazonian lowlands, along 

 the western boundary of Venezuela, and south through Ecuador. In 

 most of the region from Venezuela south through Brazil males have 

 the upper surface of the head dull without any striking crown patch 

 of glittering color. Current treatment, following Peters' summary in 

 1945 (Check-list Birds World, vol. 5, pp. 45-48), unites all these 

 groups as one species under the name furcata. While I have followed 

 this terminology I am not certain that this is appropriate. Those in 

 which the males have a glittering crown, the group colombica, while 

 differing in the extremes of deep blue and shining green on the fore 

 part of the pileum, appear connected. Most of the green-crowned 

 group from Darien and the eastern San Bias through Colombia have 

 one or two to several blue feathers along the posterior border of the 

 glittering area, markings that are absent only in the far south in 

 Ecuador. I am not aware of any similar marking to bridge the gap 

 to those with plain crown, except that the plain green on the head is 

 the usual pattern of the juvenile in the colombica group, as it is in 

 many other unrelated hummingbirds. Because of this scatter it ap- 

 pears probable that a superspecies with two or more species rather than 

 a single species may be more appropriate to represent the complex 

 status of the group. Descriptions of the two forms found in Panama 

 follow. 



