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BIRDS OF ARGENTINA, PARAGUx^Y, URUGUAY, AND CHILE 189
TAPERA NAEVIA CHOCHI (Vieillot)
Coccyzus choclii Vieillot, Nouv. Diet. Hist. Nat., vol. S, ISIT, p. 272.
( Paraguay.
On April 8, 1921, near Tapia, Tucuman, one of these birds
flushed from the ground at the border of a thicket and alighted on
a low branch among leaA^es, where it peered out Avith extended neck,
raised crest and slowly vibrating tail. It proved to be a juvenile
female barely grown. The culmen and base of the maxilla were
blackish mouse gray; remainder of maxilla buffy brown; mandible
tea green; iris smoke gray; tarsus and toes vetiver green, shaded
on side of tarsus with castor gray.
It is recorded by Hartert and Venturi '^^
that this strange cuckoo
foists its domestic cares on certain smaller birds, notably on species
of Synallaxis. Dr. H. von Ihering"" reports a young bird secured
from the rounded stick nest of Synallaxis spixi, while in another
nest of this same species he secured an incubated egg, larger and
duller in color than others in the set, that contained an unmis-
takable embryo of Tapera. Fonseca*^^ also records it as parasitic
on SynuUaxis spixi, and says that as the cuckoo is too large to enter
the globular inclosed nest of its host it tears a hole in one side
to give access to the nest cavity where it deposits its egg.
The specimen from- Tapia is in juvenal plumage, with spotted
crown and barred throat. The usage of Bangs and Penard^- has
been followed in recognizing a large southern form of Tapera,
though I find specimens from Venezuela as large as those from the
south. Individual variation in color in this species, with condition
of plumage is extensive.
MICROCOCCYX CINEREUS (Vieillot)
Coccyzus cinereus Vieillot, Nouv. Diet. Hist. Nat., vol. 8. 1817, p. 272.
(Paraguay.)
The first of these cuckoos was recorded at Victorica, Pampa, on
December 23, 1920, when an adult female was shot as it rested in
the sun in the top of a tree. The note of tiiis individual was a
sonorous cow-io cow-w cow cow, in tone like the call of the. yellow-
billed cuckoo but without the rattling, clucking termination usual
in the song of that bird. At Tapia, Tucuman, on April 7 and 8,
several were seen and three taken, including an adult pair and a
juvenile female not fully grown. They were found in rather dense,
dry scrub in a region of barrancas. The birds were alert but silent
°9Nov. ZooL, vol. IG, 1909, p. 230.
^oRev. Mus. Paulista, vol. 9, 1914, pp. 391-395.
" Rev. Mus. Paulista, vol. 13, 1923, pp. 785-787.
8- Bull. Mus. Comp. ZooL, vol. 62, April, 1918, p. 50.
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