_Todirhamphus Reichenbachii_ Hartlaub, Archiv f. Naturgesch., 18,
1852, p. 131. (Type locality, Ponapé.)
_Halcyon cinnamominus_ Finsch (part), Journ. Mus. Godeffroy, 12,
1876, pp. 17, 19 (Ponapé); _idem_, Proc. Zool. Soc. London, 1877
(1878), p. 778 (Ponapé); _idem_, Journ. f. Ornith., 1880, p. 285
(Ponapé); _idem_, Journ. f. Ornith., 1880, p. 285 (Ponapé);
_idem_, Mitth. Ornith. Ver. Wien, 1884, p. 47 (Ponapé).
_Sauropatis cinnamomina_ Salvadori (part), Ornith. Papuasia, 1,
1880, p. 481 (Ponapé).
_Halcyon cinnamomina_ Finsch, Ibis, 1881, pp. 112, 114 (Ponapé);
Tristram (part), Cat. Birds, 1889, p. 92 (Ponapé).
_Halcyon mediocris_ Sharpe, Cat. Birds British Mus., 17, 1892, p.
260 (Type locality, Ponapé); Wiglesworth, Abhandl. and Ber. Zool.
Mus. Dresden, no. 6, 1890-1891 (1891), p. 16 (Ponapé); Oustalet,
Nouv. Arch. Mus. Hist. Nat. Paris, (3), 7, 1895, pp. 177, 180,
181, 184, 185, 186 (Ponapi); Reichenow, Die Vögel, 2, 1914, p. 116
(Ponapé).
_Halcyon reichenbachi_ Wiglesworth, Abhandl. und Ber. Zool. Mus.
Dresden, no. 6, 1890-1891 (1891), p. 15 (Ponapé); Oustalet, Nouv.
Arch. Mus. Hist. Nat. Paris, (3), 7, 1895, pp. 176, 180, 181, 182,
183, 184, 185, 186 (Ponapi); Hartert, Novit. Zool., 5, 1898, p. 53
(Ponapé); Matschie, Journ. f. Ornith., 1901, pp. 112, 113 (Ponapé);
Mayr, Proc. 6th Pacific Sci. Congr., 4, 1941, p. 204 (Ponapé).
_Halcyon cinnamominus_ var. _reichenbachi_ Dubois, Syn. Avium, 1,
1902, p. 108 (Ponapé).
_Halcyon cinnamominus_ var. _mediocris_ Dubois, Syn. Avium, 1,
1902, p. 108 (Ponapé).
_Halcyon reichenbachii_ Takatsukasa and Kuroda, Tori, 1, 1915, p.
53 (Ponapé).
_Sauropatis mediocris_ Wetmore, in Townsend and Wetmore, Bull.
Mus. Comp. Zoöl., 63, 1919, p. 195 (Ponapé).
_Sauropatis reichenbachii reichenbachii_ Kuroda, in Momiyama,
Birds Micronesia, 1922, p. 60 (Ponapé).
_Hyposyma cinnamomina reichenbachii_ Mathews, Syst. Avium
Australasianarum, 1, 1927, p. 384 (Ponapé).
_Halycyon cinnamomina reichenbachii_ Hand-list Japanese Birds,
rev., 1932, p. 180 (Ponapé); Hand-list Japanese Birds, 3d ed.,
1942, p. 200 (Ponapé); Mayr, Birds Southwest Pacific, 1945, p. 293
(Ponapé); Peters, Check-list Birds World, 5, 1945, p. 206
(Ponapé).
_Halcyon cinnamomina reichenbachii_ Bequaert, Mushi, 12, 1939, p.
82 (Ponapé); idem, Occ. Papers Bernice P. Bishop Mus., 16, 1941,
p. 290 (Ponapé).
_Geographic range._--Micronesia: Caroline Islands--Ponapé.
_Characters._--Adult male: Resembles adult male of _H. c.
cinnamomina_, but with slightly smaller wing and smaller tail;
slightly longer bill; top of head paler cinnamon; feathers of back
tipped with cinnamon and bordered by backish; underparts white.
Adult female: Resembles adult male, but feathers forward of black
nape band may be mixed white and cinnamon; back and scapulars
duller and less olive.
Immature: Resembles adult, but crown streaked with greenish-black;
back and scapulars darker; wing-coverts edged with cinnamon, in
male chin and throat creamy, sides of throat, breast, and flanks
cinnamon, and axillaries, under wing-coverts, abdomen, under
tail-coverts paler cinnamon; in female chin and throat white and
rest of underparts paler than in male.
_Measurements._--Measurements are presented in table 32.
_Specimens examined._--Total number, 49 (25 males, 24 females), as
follows: Caroline Islands, USNM--Ponapé, 1 (Feb. 12); AMNH--Ponapé,
48 (Nov., Dec).
_Molt._--Most of the specimens taken by Coultas in November and
December are either worn or in molt.
_Parasites._--Bequaert (1939:82 and 1941:290) records a fly
(Hippoboscidae), _Ornithoica pusilla_, from the Micronesian
Kingfisher at Ponapé.
_Remarks._--The difference in coloration between the adults and
immatures has resulted in considerable confusion concerning the taxonomy
of this subspecies. According to Wiglesworth (1891a:15), the name
_Halcyon reichenbachii_ was established by Gustav Hartlaub in 1852 for a
kingfisher with a white abdomen in the Dresden Museum, which had been
figured by Reichenbach (Synopsis Avium, Alcedineae, 1851) and called
_Todiramphus cinnamomina_. This specimen had been mislabeled and
Hartlaub and Finsch (1868a:4), noting a resemblance between this bird
and specimens from the Palau Islands, used the name _H. reichenbachii_
for the birds from the Palaus. Later, when specimens from Ponapé were
taken, Hartlaub's bird was found to be identical with them; thus the
name _H. reichenbachii_ could be restricted to the bird at Ponapé, and
Wiglesworth supplied the new name _H. pelewensis_ for the population at
Palau. _H. mediocris_ was used by Sharpe to designate the
cinnamon-breasted birds at Ponapé, because they were assumed to belong
to a species different from the white-breasted ones. This confused
situation was not clarified until additional collections were obtained
by the Japanese.
Coultas (field notes) comments on the conspicuously different field
characters of the two color types in this bird. In 1930, he found the
bird common and usually in marginal habitat in the lowlands and at the
edges of mangrove swamps.
_Evolutionary history of Halcyon cinnamomina._--The three races of
kingfishers belonging to the species _H. cinnamomina_ have been derived
from _H. chloris_. The principal distinction between the two species is
the presence of the cinnamon coloring in _H. cinnamomina_, although
within _H. chloris_ there are some subspecies possessing traces of this
coloration. The link between these two species, as pointed out to me by
Mayr, appears to be _H. chloris matthias_ Heinroth of the St. Matthias
and Squally islands, which is colored like _H. chloris_ except that on
the head, especially on the occiput, there is a faint wash of color
ranging from buff to ochre. This coloration of the head is a step toward
the condition in the Micronesian populations of _H. cinnamomina_.
In _H. c. pelewensis_ and _H. c. reichenbachii_, the adult birds
resemble each other, although the former subspecies is slightly smaller.
The immatures of _H. c. reichenbachii_, however, possess cinnamon
coloring on the cheeks, sides of body, and breast in addition to that
present on the crown and nape. The crown and nape are of this same color
in the adults. In the subspecies at Guam, _H. c. cinnamomina_, the adult
male has the immature type of plumage found in _H. c. reichenbachii_.
The female of _H. c. cinnamomina_ has this cinnamon coloring on the
throat, but the breast, abdomen and under tail are white. The original
stock from which the Micronesian birds came may have invaded the area
via the Palau Islands, although Mayr (1940) is of the opinion that they
reached Micronesia via Ponapé (eastern Carolines) and spread to Guam
and Palau. He states further (1942b:181, 182) that the presence of _H.
cinnamomina_ and _H. chloris_ as reproductively isolated groups in the
Palaus may not indicate that they are distinct species, but that they
represent the overlap of terminal links of the same species, which have
diverged to such an extent as to leave these terminal links
reproductively isolated.
=Halcyon chloris teraokai= Kuroda