Nests, Eggs, and Young of the Azure-crowned Hummingbird (Amazilia cyanocephala)

摘要

The first of several nests (previously undescribed) of the Azure-crowned Hummingbird (Amazilia cyanocephala) was found on 20 February 2009 along the Rio Pixquiac in Coatepec, Veracruz on the Gulf of Mexico side of the Sierra Madre Oriental of Mexico. The cup-shaped nest consisted of fibers and scales of tree ferns with the outside covered with liverworts and a few mosses and lichens. It was saddled on a thin, horizontal branch and had one "tail" of hanging liverworts, longer than the height of the nest cup, draped beneath the nest. It eventually contained two white, non-glossy eggs that were long-elliptical in shape, measuring roughly 13.5 × 7.5 mm. Other nests of the species discovered subsequently were similar in construction and placed on branches or substrates of different plant species. Observations of nest building, eggs, and incubation behavior at the first nest were generally consistent with descriptions for other Amazilia hummingbirds.