Green-breasted Mango

The Green-breasted Mango (Anthracothorax prevostii) is a hummingbird that breeds from eastern Mexico and western Panama south to Colombia, Venezuela, northeasterm Bolivia, western Ecuador and just into Peru.

This small bird inhabits open country, gardens and cultivation, but its distribution is spotty and often localised. It is 10.2cm long and weighs 6.8 g. 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 (in some areas the undertail is bluish).

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

The female Green-breasted 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.

This species is very similar to the closely related Black-throated Mango. Although the male Green-breasted Mango has less 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 Green-breasted has more extensively coppery upperpart tones than its relative.

The female Green-breasted Mango lays two white eggs in a tiny cup nest on a high, thin, and usually bare, branch. Incubation by the female is 16 or 17 days, and fledging another 24.

The food of this species is nectar, often taken from the flowers of large trees. This hummingbird is also insectivorous, sometimes hovering in open areas to catch flying insects. The call of the Green-breasted Mango is a high-pitched tsup, and the song is a buzzing kazick-kazee-kazick-kazee-kazick-kazee-kazick-kazee.

The scientific name of this bird commemorates the French naturalist Florent Prévost.

References

• Birds of Venezuela by Hilty, ISBN 0-7136-6418-5