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Bulletin - United States National Museum - si-pddr - Smithsonian ...

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378 BULLETIN 133, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM<br />

congregate in small bands. Their call is a rapid check cheeky and<br />

the song a clear flutelike whistle that may be represented as tu tee-ee-<br />

ee-te. Though on August 16 males in song were seen in pursuit<br />

of females as though mating, no nests were found. The broad^<br />

flattened bill is used as a pry by thrusting it in the ground and then<br />

spreading the mandibles apart as described in Amhlycercus.<br />

The Toba Indians called them kious to ta.<br />

A male, taken September 17, had the bill and tarsus black, and<br />

the iris Vandyke brown.<br />

NOTIOPSAR CURAEUS (Molina)<br />

Turdus Curaeus Molina, Sagg. Stor. Nat. Chili, 1782, p. 252. (Chile.)<br />

Oberholser ^^ has proposed the name Notiopsar for Curaeus Sclater<br />

(1862) because of an earlier Cureus Boie (1831) for a genus of<br />

cuckoos.<br />

The Chilian blackbird was seen at Concon, Chile, from April 25<br />

to 28, 1921, where two were preserved as skins. The birds were found<br />

in small flocks in open brush on hill slopes where their slender forms<br />

and long tails at first <strong>si</strong>ght suggested thrushes. This impres<strong>si</strong>on was<br />

dispelled at once by their more or less agelaiine songs and their<br />

clucking calls, and on closer acquaintance they proved quite <strong>si</strong>milar<br />

in habits to the Pseudoleistes from east of the Andes. Their usual<br />

call is a high pitched whee whee followed by a low chnck a lah.<br />

The bill, tarsus, and feet are black, the iris fuscous.<br />

GNORIMOPSAR CHOPI CHOPI (Vieillot)<br />

Agelaius chopi Vieillot, Nouv. Diet. Hist. Nat., vol. 34, 1819, p. 537. (Para-<br />

guay.)<br />

The chopi was common through the Chaco, where it was recorded<br />

at Las Palmas, Chaco, July 16 to 30, 1920 (female taken July 16)<br />

Riacho Pilaga, Formosa, August 7 to 20 (adult male shot August<br />

17) ; Formosa, Formosa, August 24; Puerto Pinasco, Paraguay,<br />

September 1 to 29 (adult male taken at Kilometer 80, September<br />

18) ; and San Vicente, Uruguay, January 26 and 27, 1921 (adult<br />

male secured January 26).<br />

Three specimens secured at Las Palmas, Riacho Pilaga, and Puerto<br />

Pinasco, with wing measurements ranging from 116.5 mm (female)<br />

to 127 mm. (male), refer to the typical subspecies without difficulty.<br />

The fourth skin, an adult male secured near San Vicente, in the<br />

palm groves that spread over the lowlands near the eastern frontier<br />

of Uruguay, is much larger (Aving, 136 ; tail, 94.5 ; culmen from base,<br />

26; tarsus, 32.7 mm.) and must represent another form. Leverkiihn<br />

'2Proc. Biol. Soc. Washington, vol. 34, p. 136.<br />

;

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