Todd-Carriker : Birds of Santa Marta Region, Colombia. 393 



point at which it has been taken is the Paramo de Mamarongo, at about 

 12,000 feet. Dr. Chapman says of this species that it " inhabits the 

 Paramo Zone of all three ranges " of Colombia, but it certainly comes 

 lower down in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. It is a very shy 

 bird, keeping in the open or along the edges of the forest, and is very 

 difficult to approach within gunshot range. It has a loud, but rather 

 musical call-note. 



Family MIMID^E. Mocking Thrushes. 

 358. Mimus gilvus columbianus Cabanis. 



Mimiis melanopterus (not of Lawrence) Wyatt, Ibis, 1871, 115, 320 (Santa 



Marta ; habits). 

 Mimus gilvus (not Turd us gilvus Vieillot) Salvin and Godman, Biol. Centr.- 



Am., Aves, I, 1S79, 36 (Santa Marta, in range). — Salvin and Godman, Ibis, 



1880, 116 (Santa Marta; crit). — Sharpe, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., VI, 1881, 



350 (Santa Marta; crit.). 

 Minus gilvus columbianus Allen, Bull. Am. Mus. Nat. Hist., XIII, 1900, 180 



(Bonda and £ienaga). — Ridgway, Smithsonian Misc. Coll., Quarterly Issue, 



XLVII, 1904, 113, footnote (Santa Marta region; meas.). — Ridgway, Bull. 



U. S. Nat. Mus., No. 50, IV, 1907, 236, part (Santa Marta localities and 



references). 



Eighteen specimens : Bonda, Santa Marta, and Rio Hacha. 



Mimus gili-iis is a species which has received considerable attention 

 at the hands of students of geographic variation. Without attempt- 

 ing here to go into the question of the number of races it is profitable 

 to recognize, it may be stated that the Santa Marta bird is to be dis- 

 tinguished by its relatively small size and purer white under parts — ■ 

 characters which may be held to be of subspecific value on comparison. 



Wyatt remarks that " this was the first bird we saw in the Mimosa 

 thicket at the back of Santa Marta. It generally chooses one of the 

 highest boughs for a perch, and there displays its powers of song and 

 mimicry." Simons met with it in the same locality, and speaks of it 

 as being " a favourite songster here, its notes being more harmonious 

 than those of the Trupial." According to the writer's experience it is 

 fairly common in the semi-arid coast belt from Cienaga around to the 

 Rio Piedras, rare along the beach from the Rio Piedras to Dibulla, 

 but becoming common again in the arid region of the Goajira Pen- 

 insula, whence it extends into the valley country southeast of the 

 Sierra Nevada, as far at least as Valencia. It sticks close to the flat 



