Loxia luzoniensis Grant, Bull. Brit. Orn. Club (1894), 3, 51;
Ibis (1894), 516; Grant and Whitehead, Ibis (1898), 244 (eggs);
Whitehead, Ibis (1899), 239 (nesting habits); McGregor and
Worcester, Hand-List (1906), 103.
Cu-di-li-guit, Benguet Igorot.
Luzon (Whitehead, Worcester, McGregor).
Adult male.--Head and body geranium-red, clearest and brightest on
rump, tail-coverts, and under parts, more pinkish on throat, paler
on abdomen; lores, malar stripe, and ear-coverts dusky; feathers
of back and wing-coverts with dusky bases; thighs drab-gray; under
tail-coverts white, washed with geranium-pink, and with pointed
shaft-markings of dark brown; wings and tail blackish, the larger
feathers narrowly edged with geranium-pink. Length, about 140; wing,
82; tail, 51; culmen from base, 15; tarsus, 15.
Adult female.--Feathers of upper parts dark brown with lighter edges;
feathers of back edged with pale yellow; feathers on anterior part of
crown edged with light chrome-yellow; rump and tail-feathers nearly
uniform light chrome-yellow; nasal plumes, lores, and line under eye
whitish; cheeks and ear-coverts blackish brown; under parts drab-gray,
chin and throat nearly white; breast and abdomen with a faint olive
or yellow wash; tail-coverts white with pointed shaft-markings;
wing-feathers and rectrices blackish with narrow edges of gray or pale
yellow. A female, wing, 80; tail, 49; culmen from base, 16; tarsus, 15.
Young birds are dingy white heavily streaked, both above and below,
with blackish brown and more or less washed with olive-gray,
olive-yellow, or light chrome-yellow. Older individuals, probably
of the second summer, lose the dark streaks and become extensively
yellow, while still older males become indiscriminately mottled with
red and yellow.
"In the end of December, 1893, Mr. Whitehead noticed a pair of these
crossbills with nesting materials in their bills. In the following
January, while in the highlands of Benguet, he found a nest containing
three eggs and situated at the end of a pine branch. The slender
branch overhung a steep slope, and it was found impossible to secure
the eggs. Again on Mount Data, towards the end of January, 1895,
after much trouble, a second nest was discovered near the top of a
high pine-tree. This nest contained four young birds, two of which
flew away before they could be secured." (Grant and Whitehead.)
Genus PYRRHULA Brisson, 1760.
Bill very short, stout, and blunt; bill from nostril equal to its
width, and to its depth at middle of nostril; culmen and gonys
decidedly curved; tail nearly square. General color of body buffy
brown; chin black; rump white.
Species.
a1. Larger; wing, 80 mm. or more ... leucogenys (p. 678)
a2. Smaller; wing less than 80 mm.; general color more
brownish. ... steerei (p. 678)