from the November 15, 2009 Newsletter issued from Hacienda Chichen Resort beside Chichén Itzá Ruins, central Yucatán, MÉXICO
BECARD ALONG THE ROAD
When I first hiked into the Hacienda I figured I'd be walking that same road many times, and I was right. It's the road I jog each morning just before dawn and also I walk there in early morning and late afternoon when the sun is low, flooding deeply into the scrub from the road, sometimes illuminating things that usually wouldn't be seen. On one such late-afternoon birdwalk I photographed the fast-foraging bird shown below:

That's a female Rose-throated Becard, PACHYRAMPHUS AGLAIAE, common at forest edges, in open areas and the like from Mexico to Panama. During summers it spreads northward into extreme southern Texas and southern Arizona. Just the male has the rosy throat, making it easy to identify. The female is a bit more challenging, with its rusty back, pale underside and broad beak causing it to look like a Myiarchus flycatcher. The way the underside color extends around to the top of the neck, though, is fairly distinctive, as well as the dark cap. The call is a heartfelt, downward slurred tzeeeu.

Ornithologists haven't figured out exactly where to place becards on the bird branch of the evolutionary Tree of Life. At the moment they're being placed close to flycatchers, and when you see in the picture the bird's short, wide beak, that seems like a good bet.