Female Antillean Mango? image from the gallery. (1 Viewer)

Hi all,
take a look at http://www.birdforum.net/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=50860; is this actually an Antillean Mango? the images I have seen have all been from Hispaniola and therefore of a different subspecies, but they all show a bird with a light gray underside that continue all the way down, not this brown area below the breast. A sample image from Hispaniola: http://www.mangoverde.com/birdsound/picpages/pic86-62-3.html. Is there a difference between subspecies, or what is going on?

thanks
Niels

Hey Niels - I can't comment on difference in subspecies - though I can say (and you probably already know) A. d. dominicus is what you've seen in Hispaniola while A. d. aurulentus is what's in Guanica, Puerto Rico. It's by mere process of elimination using Raffaele et al's plates that I can't see this being anything other than a female Antillean Mango, but I would definitely be interested in comments others may have. I love the questions you ask, man!

No, from the info I have available the females of the two subspecies are not supposed to differ in the hue of the underparts. Comparing this photo to other photos of this species, I must admit that I don't find the difference particularly striking and certainly well within what I'd consider normal in many other species I know better. Still, I suspect this individual could be an immature. I don't have any experiance with the Antillean Mango, but a faint brownish tinge below + pale edging to some other feathers (notice uppertail coverts on the bird on this photo) is a sign of immaturity in many hummingbirds, incl. Black-throated & Green-throated Mango.

Thanks a lot! I had looked in the Raffaele guide as well, and could not come up with any alternative either. This particularly photo might be a little too contrasty, I think, but the explanation that similar species have the brownich tint satisfies me. I have put a short sentence in the Opus entry that this most likely is an immature female (this was the same photo used there).

thanks
Niels