Cisticola exilis polionota Mayr, 1934

LeCroy, M., 2008, Type Specimens Of Birds In The American Museum Of Natural History. Part 7. Passeriformes: Sylviidae, Muscicapidae, Platysteiridae, Maluridae, Acanthizidae, Monarchidae, Rhipiduridae, And Petroicidae, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 313 (1), pp. 1-287 : 46

Cisticola exilis polionota Mayr

Cisticola exilis polionota Mayr, 1934a: 14 (Baining District, New Britain).

Now Cisticola exilis polionotus Mayr, 1934 . See Coates, 1990: 86–88, Mayr and Diamond, 2001: 391, and del Hoyo et al., 2006: 465.

HOLOTYPE: AMNH 332816 , adult male, collected at Latromat , Baining area, East New Britain Province, Papua New Guinea, on 21 June 1932, by William F. Coultas on the Whitney South Sea Expedition (no. 42905).

COMMENTS: Mayr cited the AMNH number of the holotype in the original description. He ( Mayr, 1934a:1) noted that he had studied specimens collected by Coultas in New Britain in 1932 and 1933 ; these specimens are from Blanche Bay and the Baining area ( AMNH 332812–332820 , 333405– 333414 , 334408 , and 334409) and from Tol Plantation , Wide Bay ( AMNH 334393– 334407 ). Also available to Mayr at this time were specimens collected in Rabaul by Rollo Beck on the Whitney South Sea Expedition in 1928: AMNH 223937–223949 . All of these specimens are paratypes .

Coultas’ unpublished journal (Archives, AMNH Dept. of Ornithology) records that on 21 June the expedition was in its base camp at Latromat, where cisticolas were collected. From Coultas’ sketch map, Latromat is just south and west of Malabunga, 04.25S, 152.05E ( Papua New Guinea, 1984).