24 



BIRDS OF THE REPUBLIC OF PANAMA PART 4 



35 and 40 Purple Martins came to perch on dead limbs in the top 

 of a tall tree beside our living quarters. Later, on March 2, during 

 travel by launch along the seaward side of the Valiente Peninsula, I 

 noted others flying northward low over the water. Until March 6, I 

 recorded them daily, resting in dead trees over our house, in flight 

 crossing Almirante Bay, or offshore at Boca del Drago. Between 

 March 19-21, 1962, Charles O. Handley, Jr., at various localities en 

 route from Colon to Isla Escudo de Veraguas, recorded several flying 

 northwest offshore over the Caribbean (Wetmore, Smiths. Misc. Coll, 

 no. 145, 1963, p. 2) . An "all dark" Progne seen at Gamboa on April 1, 

 1968, by Ridgely was most probably this species, while 2 such at Bayano 

 Lake on April 24, 1968, with Brown-chested Martins, could be late 

 transients or Southern Martins on their migration. 



PROGNE SUBIS SUBIS (Linnaeus J 



Hirundo subis Linnaeus, Syst. Nat., ed. 10, 1758, p. 192. (Northeastern Manitoba.) 



Characters. — Size intermediate between P. s. hesperia and P. s. ar- 

 boricola; female with forehead and forecrown dark gray. 



Measurements. — Males (10 from the breeding range), wing 145.2- 

 150.3 (146.6), tail 71.2-78.4 (74.2) culmen from base 13.1-14.8 (13.8), 

 tarsus 15.0-15.7 (15.3) mm. 



Females (10 from the breeding range), wing 141.0-146.5 (144.5), 

 tail 66.2-73.6 (70.1), culmen from base 14.2-15.4 (14.9), tarsus 15.2- 

 15.9 (15.5) mm. 



Migrant and winter visitor from the north. This is the most widely 

 distributed of the races. It is known in Panama definitely from the fol- 

 lowing specimens: Coco Solito, Canal Zone, male, collected August 5, 

 1955; female, August 3, 1956 (J. E. Ambrose, specimens in American 

 Museum of Natural History); Almirante, Bocas del Toro, 2 males, 1 

 female, February 18, 1958 (A. Wetmore, in the Smithsonian collec- 

 tions). 



The type locality for the species given by Linnaeus (from Edwards) 

 as "ad sinum Hudsonis," Hudson Bay, is so listed in the A. O. U. 

 Checklist (1957, p. 365). L. L. Snyder (Can. Field-Nat., vol. 77, 1963, 

 pp. 128-129) reports that "Edwards' pre-Linnaean descriptions and 

 illustrations were based on specimens collected by James Isham be- 

 tween the years 1732 and 1745. . . . When Isham lived in the New 

 World he was stationed mostly at York Factory, but was briefly at 

 Prince of Wales Fort (= Churchill ) ." From this data Snyder cites the 

 type locality as "northeastern Manitoba." 



