THE BUFF-BELLIED HUMMINGBUiD. 225 



80. Amazilia cerviniventris Gould. 



BUFF-BELLIED HUMMINGBIRD. 



Amaniliaus cervinicenfris Gould, Proceedings Zoological Society, 1856, 150. 



(B — , G — , R 346, 420, U 439.) 



Geographical kangb: Valley of the lower Eio Graude in Texas 5 south through 

 eastern Mexico to Nicaragua, Central America. 



The Buff-bellied Hummingbird was also added to our fauna by Dr. James 

 C. Merrill, United States Army, who took the first specimen within our borders 

 on the military reservation of Fort Brown, Texas, on August 17, 1876. Since 

 then it has been ascertained to be quite a common summer visitor in the lower 

 Rio Grande Valley, and a number of its nests have been taken there. It arrives 

 in southern Texas about April 1, and returns south in the latter part of Septem- 

 ber or the beginning of October. It is one of our plainest-colored Humming- 

 birds, and its general habits, food, etc., are undoubtedly similar to those of the 

 better-known members of this family found in the United States. 



Dr. James C. Merrill says: "The Buff-bellied Hummingbird proves to be 

 an abundant summer visitor, and I have nowhere found it so abundant as on the 

 military reservation at Fort Brown. Here it seems perfectly at home among 

 the dense, tangled thickets, darting rapidly among the bushes and creeping 

 vines, and is with difficulty obtained. A rather noisy bird, its shrill cries usu- 

 ally first attract one's attention to its presence. A Hummer's nest, undoubtedly 

 made by this species, was found in September, 1877, within the fort. It was 

 placed on the fork of a dead, drooping twig of a small tree on the edge of a 

 path through a thicket; it was about 7 feet from the ground, and contained the 

 shriveled body of a young bird. The nest is made of the downy blossoms of 

 the tree on which it is placed, bound on the outside with cobwebs, and rather 

 sparingly covered with lichens, In-temally, it is somewhat less than 1 inch in 

 depth by one-half inch in diameter. The external depth is IJ inches."^ 



I have eight of these nests before me, all taken in Camei'on County, Texas, 

 which are readily distinguishable from those of other species breeding in the 

 United States whose nests are known. They are composed of shreds of vege- 

 table fiber, thistle down, and an occasional specimen is lined with a vegetable 

 substance resembling brown cattle hair; but the majority are lined with thistle 

 down. The outside is covered with bits of dry flower blossoms, shreds of 

 bark, and small pieces of light-colored lichens, securely fastened in place by 

 spider webs. The nests are neatly built, and are usually saddled on a small, 

 drooping limb, or placed on a fork of a horizontal twig, at distances of from 3 

 to 8 feet from the ground. Small trees or bushes of the Anachuita (Cordia 

 hoissieri) ebony and hackberry seem to furnish their favorite nesting sites, though 

 occasionally a nest is found in a willow. An average-sized nest measures If 

 inches in outer diameter by 1^ inches in height; the inner cup is seven-eighths 



1 Proceedings United States National Museum, Vol. I, 1878, pp. 149, 150. 

 16896— No. 3 15 



