FAMILY VIREONIDAE 



215 



1972, by C. Leahy and R. Forster, another on January 16, 1974, by 

 Leahy and Ridgely (Ridgely, 1976, p. 284). As the sightings were in 

 exactly the same place they may have been of the same bird. Another 

 bird was seen on January 24, 1977, near Fort San Lorenzo, Canal 

 Zone, by R. Rodriguez (reported in Toucan, February 1977, p. 6, sup- 

 plemented by a letter to Eisenmann). There are also recent sightings 

 from Costa Rica. The race that normally occurs closest to Panama is 

 nominate solitarius, which breeds in eastern North America and winters 

 south in Central America in Nicaragua.] 



VIREO OLIVACEUS (Linnaeus): Red-eyed Vireo, Vireo Ojirrojo 



Rather small; upper surface olive- green with gray crown and white 

 eye-stripe; lower surface white. 



Description. — Length 124-144 mm. Adult (sexes alike), crown gray 

 bordered by narrow line of blackish; sides of face, rest of upper sur- 

 face, including scapulars, and tail, grayish olive; green wing coverts, 

 primaries, and secondaries dusky, with outer web of feathers edged 

 yellowish olive; superciliary white, a narrow dusky gray stripe from 

 bill through and behind eye; loral region below superciliary blackish; 

 undersurface white; undertail coverts, sides, and flanks often tinged 

 with yellowish olive; edge of wing white; underwing coverts very light 

 yellow; edge of inner web of primaries and secondaries white on under- 

 side. 



The Red-eyed Vireo of North America is a common migrant through- 

 out Panama on its way to and from the Amazon Basin, where it spends 

 the winter. It frequents clearings, second-growth woodland, and wood- 

 land borders. Griscom (Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., vol. 72, 1932, p. 366) 

 wrote "I have yet to see any evidence to show that the Red-eyed Vireo 

 winters with any regularity in any part of Central America," and Eisen- 

 mann (Smiths. Misc. Coll., vol. 117, no. 5, 1952, p. 49), called it "a 

 common migrant and occasional winter visitant in Panama, August 14- 

 May 1, but chiefly seen in September and October, March and April." 

 Migration continues well into November. To date, there are no winter 

 specimens. 



E. S. Morton (Eisenmann in litt.) saw a few on the Pacific slope of 

 the Canal Zone in the final week of December 1970. Ridgely reports 1 

 seen well on January 9, 1974, in forest on Barro Colorado Island. 



During both spring and fall the Red-eyed Vireo is "very abundant" 

 at the banding station at Almirante (Loftin, Rogers, and Hicks, Bird- 

 Banding, 1966, p. 41 ) , often occurring in waves. In the spring of 1963, 

 for example, Loftin and Olson (Carib. Journ. Sci., vol. 3, no. 4, 1963, 



