HUMMINGBIRD SPECIES

Great-Billed Hermit 

SCIENTIFIC NAME: Phaethornis malaris

The Great-Billed Hermit is a species of hummingbird in the family Trochilidae.

It is a large hummingbird about 6.3 inches in length.

It has greenish upperparts. Underparts ranges from grayish to grayish-tawny according to the subspecies.

All forms have a dark mask through the eye, bordered above and below with whitish-buff stripes.

Some forms show central stripe on the throat, others have a whitish throat, and others have a concolor belly and throat.

Bill is very long and decurved, with a red or reddish lower mandible.

Central feathers of the tapered tail are long and white-tipped. It does overlap with the very similar Long-Billed Hermit of the west slope of the Andes.

Feed mainly on the nectar of various small, brightly colored and scented flowers, but also take small insects and spiders.

Mostly found in tropical rainforests, but also use swamp forests, moist scrublands and high-altitude scrublands. they are present from sea level up to an altitude of 2.400 m.

Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, French Guiana, Peru, Suriname, and Venezuela.

The female builds the nest alone. It is a cone woven from plant fibers with moss for camouflage. Spider webs are used to suspend it from a branch or the underside of a broad leaf, or less frequently under a bridge or from the rood of a building.

She lays 1 - 3 white eggs, which she incubates alone for 14 - 16 days and fledging another 21 - 24 days.

Each female raises a single brood per season.

SOURCES:
https://www.peruaves.org
http://planetbirds.blogspot.com
https://en.wikipedia.org
https://ebird.org