Hummingbird sp., Mexico-City, Mexico (#1) (1 Viewer)

[Bitis]

Saw this Hummingbird on January 28th 2023 in Mexico-City, in a Park near the city center (Parque Alameda Central).
Thank you!

 

[THE_FERN]

Female or imm. male broad-billed hummingbird.

 

[KenM]

Am wondering if this is an imm./fem.type White-Eared Hummingbird- roundish head, relatively short “straight” bill?

Cheers

 

[THE_FERN]

Am wondering if this is an imm./fem.type White-Eared Hummingbird- roundish head, relatively short “straight” bill?

Cheers

Tail is blue with white tip. White-eared has green tail.

 

[KenM]

Tail is blue with white tip. White-eared has green tail.

I believe that the “white tail tipping” can be seen on WEH as well, also the tail in most of the images look dark only?
Because of the iridescence factor on this group…I was wondering how the light might play on these images, preferring to prioritise on bill length and head structure. Dunno?

 

[THE_FERN]

I believe that the “white tail tipping” can be seen on WEH as well, also the tail in most of the images look dark only?
Because of the iridescence factor on this group…I was wondering how the light might play on these images, preferring to prioritise on bill length and head structure. Dunno?

We can see from the rest of the bird that the reflected light is green where the plumage is green. It would be very unusual to have a discontinuity in colour which exactly corresponds to the tail if it were a light effect. Instead, we can see the tail is a different colour to the rest of the bird. For me, that colour is blue—in my experience, blue sometimes reflects blackish but light green (i.e. the colour of the rest of the bird) seldom does. (Note that in 007 we can see green upper tail coverts which overlie blue tail feathers. The angle of light reflectance here is the same so we would expect the feathers to appear the same colour (or nearly so) if they truly were the same colour.)

I find the head and bill structure difficult to be sure about because of the blurring in the images. In any case, you can find "similar" individuals for both species in Macauley (similar if we take the lighting and image quality here into consideration). The perched photo shows a long broad based bill which looks better for broad-billed to me.

 

[Bitis]

@KenM @THE_FERN thank you very much for the interesting discussion. It really seems that female type Hummingbirds aren't that straightforward. So you think to better leave it unidentified?

 

[THE_FERN]

@KenM @THE_FERN thank you very much for the interesting discussion. It really seems that female type Hummingbirds aren't that straightforward. So you think to better leave it unidentified?

No it's a female-type broad-billed hummingbird for the reasons I said—blue tail.

 

[Bitis]

No it's a female-type broad-billed hummingbird for the reasons I said—blue tail.

Thank you very much, I really appreciate the help and also the details you give for identification!