Page:Birds of North and Middle America partV Ridgway.djvu/119

decidedly shorter; hallux about as long as inner toe but much stouter; basal phalanx of middle toe united to outer toe for most of its length, to inner toe by about half its length (or less); claws moderate or rather weak, that of the hallux decidedly shorter than its digit. Plumage full and blended, that of rump and flanks more elongated and lax; feathers of pileum not elongated.

Coloration. — Plain gray, slate color, or blackish, the back with a concealed patch of white, the wing-coverts narrowly tipped with white (lateral rectrices sometimes broadly tipped with white); adult females of some species similar but throat streaked with white, of others brown above, tawny or ochraceous below.

Nidification. — Nest (of C. nigricans) composed of dry grasses, placed in fork of a low bush. Eggs mahogany color, mottled with darker shades of the same color.^[1]

Range. — Southern Mexico to Cayenne, southeastern Brazil, and Peru. (About 10 species.)^[2]

KEY TO THE SPECIES AND SUBSPECIES OF CERCOMACRA.

a. General color black or slaty.

b. Lateral rectrices broadly tipped with white. (Cercomacra nigricans.)

c. General color deep black, the throat without white streaks. (Eastern Panama to Venezuela, Triuidád, and western Ecuadór.)

Cercomacra nigricans, adult male (p. 91).

cc. General color blackish slate (more blackish beneath), the throat streaked with white

Cercomacra nigricans, adult female (p. 92).

bb. Lateral rectrices very narrowly if at all tipped with whitish. (Cercomacra tyrannina.)

c. Paler (slate color above, slate-gray below). (Eastern Panamá to British Guiana, western Ecuadór, etc.)

Cercomacra tyrannina tyrannina, adult male (p. 93).

cc. Darker (slate-blackish above, slate color or blackish slate below). (Western Panamá to southeastern Mexico.)

Cercomacra tyrannina crepera, adult male (p. 95).

aa. General color olive-brownish above, tawny below.

b. Paler

Cercomacra tyrannina tyrannina, adult female (p. 93).

bb. Darker

Cercomacra tyrannina crepera, adult female (p. 96).

CERCOMACRA NIGRICANS Sclater.

BLACK TYRANNINE ANTBIRD.

Adult male. — Uniform deep black, relieved by white tips to wing- coverts (anterior half of lesser covert area wholly white), broad white edging to outermost feather of alula, and broad white tips to rectrices (except middle pair); feathers of back extensively white beneath surface; under wing-coverts uniform black for anterior half or more, white for posterior portion; inner webs of remiges broadly edged

(except terminally) with white; bill black; iris dark brown; legs and

---

1. Sclater and Salvin, Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond., 1879, 526.
2. Some of these doubtless only subspecies.