The TOCO TOUCAN (_Ramphastus toco_) is principally of a glossy black;
the throat, cheeks, lower throat, and upper tail-covers are white, and
the rump light red. The large high beak is bright orange-red, shading to
deep red at the culmen and towards the tip of the lower mandible; while
the tip and edges of the upper portion of the bill are black, the eyes,
cheek-stripes, and region of the temple bright red; the eyelids blackish
blue, and the legs dark grey. The length of this bird is twenty-two
inches; the wing measures eight inches and three-quarters, and the tail
five inches and a quarter.
The Toco Toucan, as we learn from the Prince von Wied, is never found
near the coast, but is plentiful in the interior of the province of Minas
Geroes and Bahia. It is abundant in the southern parts of Brazil, in
latitude thirty-two degrees south. Those observed in the neighbourhood of
Bahia were very shy, the result of their having been repeatedly fired at
by the inhabitants in defence of their fruit-trees, and to procure them
for food; notwithstanding which, the desire to feed upon the oranges and
guavas induced them to approach very near the town at the season when
those fruits were ripening. Very pretty little powder-flasks are made
of their large, finely-coloured bills. "M. Natterer," writes Gould, in
his magnificent work on the _Ramphastidæ_, "who first met with this bird
in the province of St. Paul, and afterwards on the coast of Goyay and
Mattogrosso, on the banks of the Amazon and Upper Rio Branco", remarks
that "it will probably be found on all parts of Brazil, and believes that
the bird prefers woods adjoining sandy plains, for he more than once met
with it in low steppes and coppices, where ripe fruits were to be found.
We generally met with it in small families, and observed that the bill
varied in length according to the age and sex of the bird; and that its
note, resembling 'gr-r-ra,' was deeper than that of any other member of
the family." Mr. Edwards tells us that he saw the nest of this species
in the fork of a large tree over the water of the Amazon, but we are of
opinion that the nidification of this bird should be described by other
observers before full reliance be placed on the assertion that it makes a
nest, for the hollows of trees are the usual incubating places of all the
Toucans.