Trip to Barcelos Mario Cohn-Haft - Friday, September 20, 1996 |
For this trip, the goal was to collect specimens of each of the three different species of
Hemitriccus flycatchers along both sides of the river at Barcelos. Hemitriccus is a genus
of tiny, green birds that all look and sound almost identical. Im trying to determine the
fine points of their distributions in the Amazon and document the nature of the
variation in voice and plumage within each species throughout the area in which it
occurs.
On the east bank of the river I only got 2 days in terra firme (you have to travel some
distance to get out of flooded forest on this side), and the mornings were overcast and
quiet. All I got was a couple of birds from the closely related genus, Colopteryx, but no
Hemitriccus zosterops, which I expected to find. I cant say with confidence that
zosterops isnt there and Colopteryx takes its place, because of how little time I had, the
weather, and perhaps because the forest wasnt undisturbed. Hmmm, will need to look
into that some more.
The research went slowly because the Igapo was still flooded (extraordinarily high water yearlast year was extraordinarily low!), and chasing birds by boat was awkward.
Igapo birds are much easier to find when you can walk in after them.
I was able to find lots of nests, though, corroborating my impression that almost
everything here nests in the heart of the dry season.
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