Racket-tailed coquette | |
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Mounted specimen of Discosura longicaudus, the racket-tailed coquette | |
Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Aves |
Clade: | Strisores |
Order: | Apodiformes |
Family: | Trochilidae |
Genus: | Discosura |
Species: | D. longicaudus |
Binomial name | |
Discosura longicaudus (Gmelin, JF, 1788) | |
Range of the racket-tailed coquette | |
Synonyms [3] | |
Discosura longicauda(Gmelin, 1788) |
The racket-tailed coquette (Discosura longicaudus; sometimes Discosura longicauda) is a species of hummingbird in the family Trochilidae native to northern South America.
The racket-tailed coquette was formally described in 1788 by the German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin in his revised and expanded edition of Carl Linnaeus's Systema Naturae . He placed it with all the other hummingbirds in the genus Trochilus and coined the binomial name Trochilus longicaudus. [4] Gmelin based his description on the "L'oiseau-mouche à raquettes" that had been described by the French polymath Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon in 1779 in his Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux. [5] Buffon did not specify the origin of his specimen but in 1902 Hans von Berlepsch and Ernst Hartert designated the type locality as Cayenne, French Guiana. [6] [7] The racket-tailed coquette is now placed with four other hummingbirds in the genus Discosura that was introduced in 1850 by the French naturalist Charles Lucien Bonaparte. [8] [9] Formerly, ornithologists erroneously used the binomial name Discosura longicauda instead of Discosura longicaudus. [10] The genus name combines the Ancient Greek diskos meaning "plate" with oura meaning "tail". The specific epithet longicaudus combines the Latin longus meaning "long" and cauda meaning "tail". [11] The species is treated as monotypic: no subspecies are recognised. [9]
It is sometimes considered to be the only member of the genus Discosura , as the thorntails, the other possible members of the genus, are often placed in the genus Popelairia. [12] [13]
Martin Johnson Heade depicted two coquettes in his painting Two Green-Breasted Hummingbirds (c. 1863), as part of his "Gems of Brazil". [14]
The species weighs about 3.4 grams (0.12 oz) and is sexually dimorphic. The male is around 10.2 centimetres (4.0 in) long and has a distinctive brilliant green head and throat with a copper-coloured abdomen. The dark purple-brown tail is 5.1 centimetres (2.0 in) long, and forked, with two very long prongs, ending with a pair of round paddle- ("racket") shaped feathers. The female is shorter with a length of 6.9 centimetres (2.7 in). It has duller green upperparts and breast, black throat bordered by white and a white belly. Its tail is grey tipped with white, [15] and lacks "rackets". [16]
The racket-tailed coquette has a wide distribution range; it is found in northern Brazil, French Guiana, Guyana, Suriname, and southern Venezuela. It is also found on the eastern tip of Brazil [12] Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests, as well as riparian forests and scrubby savannahs. [13]
Racket-tailed coquettes typically gather in the canopy of hapaxanth trees with other hummingbirds and steal other larger hummingbirds' nectar. They are consequently chased by the larger birds. [15]
They build their cup-sized nests out of soft plants and down 3–6 metres (9.8–19.7 ft) up a tree. Females usually have a clutch of two eggs, which are incubated for 13–14 days. [16]
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