BIRDS FROM BRAZIL AND SOUTHERN VENEZUELA—FRIEDMANN 475 
1 ad. o, Venezuela, Brazo Casiquiare, near Cafio Pamoni, February 19, 1931. 
lad. o&, lad. 9, Venezuela, Brazo Casiquiare, below Cafio Caripo, February 
22, 1931. 
2 ad. 9, Venezuela, Upper Orinoco, near Isla Temblador, February 25, 1931. 
3 ad. co’, lad. 2, Veaezuela, Upper Orinoco, San Antonio, February 28—-March 
2-9, 1931. 
1 ad. o&, 3 ad. 9, Venezuela, Upper Orinoco, opposite Corocoro Island, right 
bank March 12-16, 1931. 
2ad. o,2ad. 9, Venezuela, Upper Orinoco, Puerto Ayacucho, May 8-17, 1931, 
One of the May specimens was noted as being in breeding condition 
when collected; some of the November, January, and February birds 
were in molt. One of the males from Playa de Candela is probably 
wrongly sexed, as it has the female plumage. 
There is considerable variation in the darkness or paleness of the 
upperparts and breast and flanks, especially in the females from 
southern Venezuela. It should be kept in mind that Zimmer noted 
that south Venezuelan birds approach typical melanopogon in color- 
ation and are in reality intermediate between the present race and 
the nominate form. 
None of the present series has any concealed white patch on the 
interscapulars as Zimmer found in some Venezuelan birds, but quite 
a number have the basal portions of these feathers considerably paler 
gray than the exposed, more distal parts. 
According to the specimens of the two races of this antcreeper listed 
by Zimmer (cit. supra, p. 24) the Saéo Gabriel and, probably, the 
Cucuhy, birds should be H. m. melanopogon. I cannot distinguish 
them, however, from any of the Casiquiare or Orinoco birds. In fact, 
the female from Sao Gabriel is more in accord with the characters of 
occidentalis than are birds from the Upper Orinoco. Zimmer writes 
that typical melanopogon ‘‘approaches the range of occidentalis most 
closely on the Rio Negro in Brazil. Spreading northward from the 
Guianas, melanopogon extends westward alorg the left bank of the 
upper Rio Negro to Sao Gabriel, across the Negro from part of the area 
occupied by occidenialis. A series of both sexes from the right bank 
of the Negro near its mouth (Mirapinima and Igarapé Cacao Pereira) 
definitely belongs to melanopogon and shows that this form crosses the 
river somewhere between its mouth and the junction of the Branco 
.’ The influence of rivers as demarcating limits of subspecific 
ranges appears to be less marked in this than in many other species, as 
the nominate form crosses the Amazon itself between the Tocantins 
and the Xingt, and again between the Tapajéz and the Puris. 
On December 30, 1929, two specimens were taken in Estado Bolivar, 
northern Venezuela, and were preserved in alcohol. It is not possible 
to identify them subspecifically in their present condition. 
