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Jan., 1917
THE SUBSPECIES OF HESPERIPHONA VESPERTINA
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more yellowish even than in californica. Yellow frontal bar of male very narrow, averaging narrower than in any other form. Color-tone of body of female browner than in any other form, sharply different from the gray east in vespertina and the sooty tone above in brooksi; paler in tone of brown beneath than in californica, most nearly as in warreni.

Summer range.—Specimens at hand only from the following places, all probably breeding localities: Mirador and Las Vigas, both not far from Vera Cruz, Mexico; Huachuca and Chirlcahua mountains, Arizona. I am unable to distinguish the birds of extreme southern Arizona from the Vera Cruz birds.


Hesperiphona vespertina warreni[1], new subspecies

Rocky Mountain Evening Grosbeak

Type.—Male; no. 1399, Colorado College Mus.; Bear Creek, near Colorado Springs, Colorado; June 19, 1898; C. E. Aiken.

Diagnosis.—Bill of moderate degree of thickness, seemingly identical in this respect with californica; therefore much thicker than in montana, and yet unmistakably slenderer than in vespertina. Color-tone of body of male averaging the same as in californica. Frontal yellow bar of male broad, very nearly as broad as in vespertina, therefore decidedly broader than in californica. Color-tone of body of female averaging nearest montana, slightly paler perhaps, therefore notably different from the usual case in vespertina; slightly paler about the head than in californica, and decidedly paler than in brooksi.

Summer range.—Southern Rocky Mountain region, at least in Colorado, New Mexico and north-central Arizona. Specimens in the American Museum of Natural History taken by Mearns in the vicinity of Fort Verde, Arizona, belong here, and not to the form represented in the Chiricahua and Huachuca mountains, in the same state, these latter being unequivocally montana as here understood.


IMPORTANT LITERATURE RELATING TO SYSTYMATIC STATUS OF WESTERN EVENING GROSBEAKS

Baird, S. F.

1870. In Cooper's Ornithology of California (Geol. Surv. Calif.), Land Birds, Volume 1, pp. xi+592, numerous figs. in text.

Technical paragraph (pp. 175-176) setting forth differences between "two strongly marked varieties", but no new name given, both being included under Hesperiphona vespertina; also two figures (pp. 174, 175), one, small-billed, with "Mexico" printed beneath, these being the same woodcuts as subsequently used in Baird, Brewer and Ridgway, 1874, plate xxii.

Ridgway, R.

1874. In Baird, Brewer and Ridgway's History of North American Birds. Land Birds, Volume 1. pp. xxviii+596+vi, pls. xxvi, many figs. in text.

Original designation of "var. montana" (pp. 449, 450), with figure (pl. xxii, fig. 4, the same cut as in Cooper's Ornithology, p. 175) labeled: "Mex., 35150". Otherwise no particular specimen mentioned.

Mearns, E. A.

1890. Descriptions of a New Species and Three New Subspecies of Birds from Arizona. Auk, vii, pp. 243-251.

Extended account (pp. 246-249) of "Coccothraustes vespertina montana Ridgway" with full discussion of this form as then understood, "inhabiting Mexico and the southern Rocky Mountain region." A "type" is for the first time specifically mentioned as such and is stated to have come from Cantonment Burgwin, New Mexico.


  1. Named in recognition of Edward R.?Varren's contributions to the ornithology of. Colorado.