FAMILY T f I RAUPIDAE 



447 



to place it in the collections of the Museo Zoologico of Florence or 

 those of the University of Pisa. The bird was originally supposed to 

 have come from Cuba, which was the type locality given in the original 

 description, though Bonaparte (Consp. Gen. Av., vol. 1, 1850, p. 242) 

 later gave this as "Mexico vel Cuba." Berlepsch (Proc. V. Int. Orn. 

 Congr., 1912, p. 1060) suggested Guatemala as an appropriate locality, 

 which is accepted here. 



RAMPHOCELUS PASSERINII COSTARICENSIS Cherrie 



Ramphocehis costaricensis Cherrie, 1891, Auk, 8, p. 62. (Pozo Azul de Pirns, 

 Costa Rica.) 



Characters. — Adult male with red of upper surface lighter than scar- 

 let. Female and immature male with band across breast dark orange. 



A male collected at Puerto Armuelles, Chiriqui, on January 30, 1966, 

 had the iris bright reddish brown; tip of bill black; rest of bill pale 

 neutral gray, changing to grayish white in swollen base of mandibular 

 rami; inside tip of maxilla and inside cutting edge of mandible and tip 

 dull black; tarsus and toes fuscous-black; claws narrowly dark neutral 

 gray at base changing to black at tips. 



Measurements. — Males (10 from Chiriqui), wing 74.5-81.0 (78.9), 

 tail 64.9-73.0 (68.7), culmen from base 16.3-18.7 (17.1), tarsus 22.0- 

 23.5 (22.6) mm. 



Females (10 from Chiriqui), wing 73.3-78.8 (76.1), tail 66.0-70.9 

 (69.0), culmen from base 16.5-18.5 (17.4), tarsus 21.5-23.8 (22.4) 

 mm. 



Resident. Common in lowlands and foothills of Chiriqui and west- 

 ern Veraguas, where I collected an immature male on June 9, 1953, on 

 the upper Rio Bubi near El Zapatillo. Near El Volcan, Chiriqui, it 

 ranges as high as 1300 m. Like the race of the Caribbean side, costari- 

 censis is found in pairs or small groups that are decidedly shy and tend 

 to remain hidden. As they do not decoy to squeaking, they are often 

 hard to see, and still more difficult to obtain as specimens. 



Records indicate that males may breed before attaining adult plum- 

 age. Cherrie (Auk, 1893, p. 278) writing of their breeding in Costa 

 Rica, states that when he collected both parents of a nest, a majority of 

 the males were "wearing the same dress as the females." Others were 

 in mottled plumage, and some in definitive plumage. A male, with 

 testes enlarging toward breeding condition that I shot at Buena Vista, 

 above Concepcion, Chiriqui, on March 1, 1960, was in immature plum- 

 age except for a few black feathers scattered over the head and breast. 

 This pattern of feathering is seen so commonly through the nesting 



