Democratic Sentinel, Volume 8, Number 25, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 July 1884 — A Bird Country. [ARTICLE]

A Bird Country.

That Guatemala, as the commencement of the narrowing land strip of North America, accommodates with homes a great many of the migratory birds, and that Buch a country, which in its tropical climate on the coasts, eternal spring in its middle elevation, and cold atmosphere on the heights, dotted by lakes and covered by a network of rivers, rivulets, brooks, and brooklets, and blessed with the fruits of both hot and cool temperatures, has many creatures peculiarly its own, needs no expatiation. The birds, for instance, encountered here are said to represent 600 species. There are no eagles, so to say, but three kinds of hawks, the same number of buzzards, or carrion crows, and six different marauders at night. The sparrow family is the dominant in the land, for it numbers 410 species. The calibri, or humming bird, is found in thirty-six species, belonging to twenty-eight genera. In the parrot family eight species are known as Auroras, all of brilliant and metallic plumage. The quetzal or qnesal, the most beautiful and striking of all the Guatemala birds, and which stands on top of the State’s escutcheon, forms a genus by itself. It inhabits the highest mountains, particularly in Varapaz, but that relentless tyrant, fashion, penetrates its craggy fastness, butchers it unmercifully, and ornaments her silly person with the borrowed plumage. Several hundred of them are thus slaughtered every year. Of the hooded parrots there are eight, while the common ones, called loros, are divided into fourteen species. Among the songsters the pitoreal, a small black bird living on bananas, plantains, and similar fruits, and resembling our catbird, is considered the finest, and called the nightingale of the country. In the gallinaceous order, one may mention the pau-jil, a magnificent wild creature, quail in make-up, turkey in size, and pheasant in color, with a long, slightly curved and round-pointed bill and a crest consisting of fine blue-black and white speckled feathers, of which the first is five and the last is three inches in length. When caught quite young it is easily tamed and contented in the poultry-yard, but in the first and second pairing season is sure to steal silently away into the wilderness. The turkey of the Cordilleras, called pavo de cacho is peculiar to the highest volcanic summits. Singularly, the turkey of Peten is confined to that region, and is of a distinct species. Of partridges and quails there are seven, and of pigeons seventeen species, not counting the sea-pigeons, waders, as the heron, crane, shite-poke, sandpiper, snipe, woodcock, curlew, widgeon, and rail or water hen, are believed to have more than two hundred and fifty species. There is also a variety among the webfooted birds. —Nashville American.