Black-throated Mango

The black-throated mango (''Anthracothorax nigricollis'') is a hummingbird species native to South America and Trinidad and Tobago.

Description

It is 10.2 cm long and weighs 7.2g. The longish black bill is slightly decurved. The tail in both sexes has dark central feathers, the outer tail being wine-red tipped with black.

The male has glossy bright green upperparts. His throat and chest are matt black, bordered with blue-green. The flanks are bright green, and the black of the chest tapers onto the belly.

The female black-throated mango has bronze-green upperparts and white underparts with a black central stripe. Immature birds show some grey or buff feather tips on the head and wings, and have brown around the eyes.

The call of the black-throated mango is a high-pitched ''tsiuck'', and the song is a buzzing ''hsl-hsl-hsl-hsl-hsl-hsl-hsl''.

It is very similar to the closely related green-breasted mango. Although the male black-throated mango has more extensive black on the underparts, this and other plumage differences are not always easy to confirm in the field because the birds appear all-black. The females of the two species can be almost inseparable, although the black-throated lacks the more extensively coppery upperpart of its relative.

Distribution and ecology

It breeds from Panama south to northeastern Bolivia, southern Brazil and northern Argentina. It is also common on both Trinidad and Tobago. It is a local or seasonal migrant, with some birds moving up to 1000 miles, although its movements are not well understood.

It inhabits open country, gardens and cultivation. Though it will adapt to human activity, it seems less of a generalist than for example the gilded sapphire (''Hylocharis chrysura'') or the sapphire-spangled emerald (''Amazilia lactea'').Baza Mendonça & dos Anjos (2005)

The food of this species is nectar, often taken from the flowers of large trees. This hummingbird is also notably insectivorous, often hovering in open areas to catch flying insects. It appears to be somewhat picky regarding favorite foodplants and often does not visit ornamental plants popular with many other hummingbirds, such as '' Erythrina speciosa'' or '' Stifftia chrysantha''; certain ornamental Bignoniaceae like the fountain tree (''Spathodea campanulata'') seem more to this bird's liking. They also feed off of the flowers of ''Palicourea crocea''. While feeding, it has been observed to dominate over a glittering-bellied emerald (''Chlorostilbon lucidus'') and to be displaced by a gilded hummingbird, both considerably smaller species.

The black-throated mango's breeding season lasts almost year-round in most of its range. It builds a tiny cup nest on a high, thin, and usually bare branch.E.g. of '' Macrolobium'' sp. (Greeney & Merino M. 2006) For this it uses fluff like seed down, cladding the outside with lichen. Nests are maybe 35–40 mm wide and 25–30 mm tall on the outside and some 25 mm wide and 10–15 mm deep inside. The two all-white eggs measure c.15 by 9.5 mm. They are incubated by the female for 16 or 17 days, and fledging takes another 24.Greeney & Merino M. (2006)

At a black-throated mango nest in Cuyabeno Faunistic Reserve, Ecuador, it was noted that the tree was beset with ''Pseudomyrmex'' stinging ants. This was also noted at a green-breasted mango nest on San Andrés Island in the Colombian Caribbean. It is likely that the ants would deter predators, but it is not known whether the birds deliberately select such trees for nesting.

Gallery

Anthracothorax nigricollis -Piraju, Sao Paulo, Brasil-8.jpg, female, Brazil
Female Black-throated Mango (Anthracothorax nigricollis).jpg, female
Anthracothorax nigricollis-Black-throated Mango (female).JPG, female on nest at Novo Mundo, Mato Grosso State, Brazil

Footnotes

References

* Baza Mendonça, Luciana & dos Anjos, Luiz (2005): Beija-flores (Aves, Trochilidae) e seus recursos florais em uma área urbana do Sul do Brasil ummingbirds (Aves, Trochilidae) and their flowers in an urban area of southern Brazil ortuguese with English abstract''Revista Brasileira de Zoologia'' 22(1): 51–59. PDF fulltext
* ffrench, Richard; O'Neill, John Patton & Eckelberry, Don R. (1991): ''A guide to the birds of Trinidad and Tobago'' (2nd edition). Comstock Publishing, Ithaca, N.Y..
* Greeney, Harold F. & Merino M., Paúl A. (2006): Notes on breeding birds from the Cuyabeno Faunistic Reserve in northeastern Ecuador. ''Boletín de la Sociedad Antioqueña de Ornitología'' 16(2): 46–57
PDF fulltext
* Hilty, Steven L. (2003): ''Birds of Venezuela''. Christopher Helm, London.

External links

Black-throated Mango videos
on the Internet Bird Collection

(for Trinidad and Tobago) with RangeMap
Black-throated Mango photo gallery
VIRE
Photo-High ResPhoto-High Res--Bird sitting on Nest
www1.nhl.nl—"Suriname Birds"—Map and 4 High Res photos

{{Taxonbar, from=Q998729

black-throated mango
Birds of Panama
Hummingbird species of South America
Birds of Colombia
Birds of Venezuela
Birds of Ecuador
Birds of the Amazon Basin
Birds of the Guianas
Birds of Brazil
Birds of the Peruvian Amazon
Birds of the Bolivian Amazon
Birds of Trinidad and Tobago
Birds of the Caribbean
Birds of Paraguay
black-throated mango
black-throated mango