Page:Birds of North and Middle America partV Ridgway.djvu/167

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BIRDS OF NORTH AND MIDDLE AMERICA.
139

(not ridged) posteriorly, the plantar scutella forming a single series which bends around from the outer to the inner side, where separated from the inner edge of the acrotarsium by a distinct groove; middle toe, with claw, longer than tarsus; outer toe, -without claw, not reaching to middle of subterminal phalanx of middle toe, the inner toe very slightly shorter; hallux as long as outer toe, but much stouter; basal phalanx of middle toe wholly united to outer toe, for about half its length to inner toe; claws moderate in size and curvature, that of the hallux shorter than the digit. Plumage rather thin, but feathers mostly broad and distinctly outlined, those of rump and flanks more elongated and lax; feathering of head very short (scale- like on superciliary region and sides of neck), the rictal and postocular regions naked.

Coloration. — Above brownish, with a concealed white dorsal patch; wings black with two buffy or fulvous bands (tips of middle and greater coverts) and an oblique band of same across subterminal portion of primaries; a broad white band across inner webs of remiges near base; under parts of body gray, the throat and upper chest black in male, rufous-tawny in female.

Range. — Nicaragua to Cayenne and Ecuadór. (Two species.[1])

KEY TO THE SPECIES OF RHOPOTERPE.

a. Inner webs of remiges crossed by a band of white; remiges without buff or tawny terminal spots; upper tail-coverts and tail cinnamon-rufous. (Cayenne and British Guiana to eastern Ecuadór.)

Rhopoterpe torquata (extralimital).[2]

aa. Inner webs of remiges crossed by a band of buff or tawny; remiges tipped with a buff or tawny spot; upper tail-coverts and tail brown. (Eastern Nicaragua.)

Rhopoterpe stictoptera (p. 139).

RHOPOTERPE STICTOPTERA Salvin.

RICHARDSON'S ANTTHRUSH.

Allied to R. torquata and of the same size and for the most part similar in coloration; but top of head darker, rump and tail more

fuscous, outer web of remiges with a distinct terminal spot of fawn


  1. The above description is based entirely on the type of the genus, R. torquata (Gmelin). R. stictoptera Salvin, of Nicaragua, which I have not seen, is apparently very similar in coloration, but has the band across inner webs of remiges fulvous instead of white.
  2. 'Formicarius torquatus Boddaert, Tabl. Pl. Enl., 1783, 43 (Cayenne; based on Le Fourmillier de Cayenne Daubenton, Pl. Enl., pl. 700, fig. 1). — Rhopoterpe torquata Sclater, Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond., 1858, 275; Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., xv, 1890, 298. — [Turdus] formicivorus Gmelin, Syst. Nat., i, pt. 2, 1788, 828 (based on Fourmillier de Cayenne Daubenton, Pl. Enl., pl. 700, fig. 1). — Myrmothera formicivora Vieillot, Nouv. Diet. d'Hist. Nat., xii, 1817, 114, pl. D. 26. — Rhopoterpe formicivora Cabanis, Wiegmann's Archiv für Naturg., 1847, pt. i, 228. — Formicivorus palikour Temminck, Cat. Syst. Cabinet d'Orn., 1807, 93 (new name for Turdus formicivorus Gmelin). — Myioturdus palikour Ménétriés, Mém. Acad. St. Petersburg, sér. vi (Sci. Nat.), 1 (Livr. 5), 1835, 470.