Todd-Carriker : Birds of Santa Marta Region, Colombia. 517 



496. Sporophila haplochroma Todd. 



Phonipara bicoior (not Fringilla bicolor Linnaeus) Allen, Bull. Am. Mus. 

 Nat. Hist., XIII, 1900, 165 (Minca; crit.). 



Sporophila haplochroma Todd, Ann. Carnegie Mus., VIII, 1912, 200 (Cincin- 

 nati [type-locality] and Minca; orig. descr. ; type in coll. Carnegie Mus.; 

 meas. ; crit). 



Catamenia haplochroma Brabourne and Chubb, Birds S. Am., I, 1912, 368 

 (ref. orig. descr.; range). 



Nineteen specimens: Cincinnati, Minca, and Pueblo Viejo. 



There is little to add to the original account of this species, the 

 acquisition of additional specimens having fully confirmed its char- 

 acters as denned. June and July specimens are noticeably duller than 

 those shot in March and April, and their bills average darker, but 

 otherwise there is little variation. Messrs. Brabourne and Chubb have 

 referred it to Catamenia, evidently at the suggestion of Mr. Hellmayr, 

 whose remarks (Novitates Zoologies, XX, 1913, 237) on the proper 

 allocation of 6". obscura, with which it was compared in the descrip- 

 tion, should be consulted in this connection. But the writer cannot 

 indorse such a reference in the case of either of these two species, 

 and is of the opinion that they had better be left in Sporophila. In 

 S. haplochroma the bill is rather more compressed than in many of the 

 other species of this group, the lateral outlines being faintly concave, 

 but scarcely any two of the species are exactly alike in respect to the 

 shape of the bill, and the present form is not out of place here. 



Two individuals of this inconspicuously colored seedeater were se- 

 cured at Minca by Mr. Smith's collectors, and erroneously referred to 

 "Phonipara" bicolor by Dr. Allen. It turns out that Mr. Brown se- 

 cured it also, taking one specimen each at Palomina, San Francisco, 

 and La Concepcion, these examples being doubtfully identified by Mr. 

 Bangs as 5". guttnralis, but the records were not published at the time. 



It was first seen by the writer at the hacienda Cincinnati in' June, 

 191 1, where it was found frequenting the edge of the forest, and in the 

 new clearings. Only one small flock was seen, from which three speci- 

 mens were eventually secured. Later it was found at Minca, but was 

 very scarce, being noted in company with Orysoborus funereus and 

 other species of seedeaters, but keeping to the ground more than any 

 of the latter. It was present also, although only in small numbers, 

 around Pueblo Viejo and in the Chirua Valley. It is thus a species 

 not known to go beyond the Tropical Zone in this region. 



