Page:Birds of North and Middle America partV Ridgway.djvu/98

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BULLETIN 50, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM.

Frio, Costa Rica). — Salvadori and Festa, Boll. Mus. Zool., etc., xv, no. 362, 1899, 30 (Foreste del Rio Peripa, w. Ecuadór). — Goodfellow, Ibis, 1902, 64 (Santo Domingo, w. Ecuadór). — Berlepsch and Hartert, Novit. Zool., ix, 1902, 74 (Maipures, etc., Venezuela; crit.; descr. nest and eggs). — Carriker, Ann. Carnegie Mus., vi, 1910, 608 (Caribbean lowlands up to 1,500 ft., Costa Rica; crit.; habits).

[Myrmotherula] melæna Pelzeln, Orn. Bras., iv, Abth., 1870, 418. — Sclater and Salvin, Nom. Av. Neotr., 1873, 72. — Sharpe, Hand-list, iii, 1901, 22.
M[yrmophila] melæna Cabanis and Heine, Mus. Hein., ii, July, 1859, 13.
Myrmotherula albigula Lawrence, Ann. Lyc. Nat. Hist. N. Y., viii, 1867, 131 (Panamá Railway; coll. G. N. Lawrence; = ?; see Salvin, Ibis, 1874, 317); ix, 1868, 108 (Angostura, Costa Rica). — Frantzius, Journ. für Orn., 1869, 305 (Costa Rica).

MYRMOPAGIS SCHISTICOLOR (Lawrence).

SLATY ANTWREN.

Similar to M. menetriesii D'Orbigny (?)[1] but tail much longer (both absolutely and relatively); adult male with wing-coverts much darker, the lesser and middle coverts being wholly black (except for the white terminal spots), instead of slate color with black subterminal area, and inner-anterior portion of lesser wing-covert area much less extensively white.

Adult male. — Above mainly uniform slate color; wing-coverts, which are black, each tipped with a transversely subtriangular or subrounded spot of white; primary coverts and alula also black, the former with a small white mark at tip of outer web, the latter terminally margined with white; a white patch (mostly concealed) at junction of wing and body; chin, throat, and chest (sometimes breast also, at least medially) uniform black; malar region black, barred with slate-gray; sides of head and neck, together with lateral and posterior under parts, uniform slate color, except under tail-coverts, which are margined terminally with white and barred subterminally with black; under wing-coverts mixed white and blackish; inner webs of remiges broadly edged with brownish white; bill black; iris brown; legs and feet grayish, horn color, or dusky (bluish gray or grayish blue in life); length (skins), 90-105 (96.5); wing, 54-61 (56.8); tail, 33-38 (36); culmen, 12.5-14.5 (13.3); tarsus, 15.5-17 (16.3); middle toe, 9.5-10 (9.7).[2]


  1. Never having seen a specimen from Bolivia (the type locality of Myrmothera menetriesii) comparison of Colombian and Central American specimens has been made with one from Napo, eastern Ecuadór, which may or may not represent the true M. menetriesii. The specimen in question, while having the wing as long as the shortest-winged example of M. schisticolor (54 mm.) has the tail barely 28 mm., the shortest-tailed adult male of M. schisticolor having the tail 33.5 mm., while others range up to 38 mm.
  2. Twenty-two specimens from Costa Rica, Panamá, and Colombia.