Mr. Belt, in his entertaining work ‘ The Naturalist in Nicaragua ’ (pp. 122, 123), 
gives a note on the birds of this family met with in that country: 
“ The Trogons are general feeders. I have taken from their crops the remains 
of fruits, grasshoppers, beetles, termites, and even small crabs and land-shells. Three 
species are not uncommon in the forest round San Domingo. In all of them 
the females are dull brown or slaty black on the back and neck, these parts being 
beautiful bronze-green in the male. The largest species (Trogon massena, Gould) is 
1 foot in length, dark bronze-green above, with the smaller wing-feathers speckled white 
and black, and the belly of a beautiful carmine. Sometimes it sits on a branch above 
where the army of ants are foraging below ; and when a grasshopper or other large insect 
flies up and alights on a leaf, it darts after it, picks it up, and returns to its perch. 
I sometimes found them breaking into the nests of the termites with their strong hills, 
and eating the large soft-bodied workers; and it was from the crop of this species that 
I took the remains of a small crab and land-shell ( Helicina ). 
Of the two smaller species, one (Trogon atricollis, Vieill.) is bronze-green above, 
with speckled black-and-white wings, belly yellow, and under-feathers of the tail barred 
with black. The other (Trogon caligatus, Gould) is rather smaller, of similar colours, 
excepting the head, whjch is black, and a dark blue collar round the neck. 
“Both species take short, quick, jerky flights, and are often met with along with 
flocks of other birds (Flycatchers, Tanagers, Creepers, Woodpeckers, &c.), that hunt 
together, traversing the forests in flocks of hundreds belonging to more than a score 
of different species ; so that whilst they are passing over, the trees seem alive 
with them. 
“ Mr. Bates has mentioned similar gregarious flocks met with by him in Brazil; and 
I never went any distance into the woods around San Domingo without seeing them. The 
reason of their association together may be partly for protection, as no rapacious bird or 
mammal could approach the flock without being discovered by one or other of them; but the 
principal reason appears to be that they play into each other’s hands in their search for food. 
