Tanagra berlepschi Dalmas

LeCroy, Mary, 2012, Type Specimens Of Birds In The American Museum Of Natural History Part 10. Passeriformes: Emberizidae: Emberizinae, Catamblyrhynchinae, Cardinalinae, Thraupinae, And Tersininae, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 2012 (368), pp. 1-125 : 81-82

[ Tanagra berlepschi Dalmas ]

Dalmas (1900b: 136) described Tanagra berlepschi based on specimens collected on Tobago in November and December 1898 ; he had both male and female specimens, but did not designate a type or say how many specimens he examined.

Hellmayr (1936: 211) said that the type of berlepschi from Tobago had been in the Dalmas Collection, was subsequently in the Rothschild Collection, and was, in 1936, in AMNH. This is incorrect, as there are no Dalmas specimens of berlepschi in AMNH and none came with the Rothschild Collection. However, this statement probably led Zimmer to look for the type. He had considered AMNH 509067 a possible type of Tanagra berlepschi and had written a note on the reverse of the AMNH type label: ‘‘The only one of the original series with the name on the original label. J.T.Z.’’ However, the specimen was not part of the original series, nor was it collected by Dalmas. It was collected by E. André’s collectors on 23 May 1903, three years after the name was introduced by Dalmas (1900b: 136). It has no possible standing as type of berlepschi . In fact, the entire series of specimens collected by André’s collectors is dated 1903. Because the specimen bears an AMNH type label and has perhaps been considered the type by some investigators, it remains in the type collection, with a label indicating that it has no standing as a type.

Hellmayr (1931: 163), in his obituary of Dalmas, noted that Dalmas had sponsored André’s collecting trips to western Colombia and Venezuela, but I have found no evidence that André had been associated with Dalmas’ earlier collecting in the West Indies from his yacht Chazalie. Hellmayr also noted that the surviving part of Dalmas’ collection had been acquired by Rothschild and by the museum in Munich, but Hartert (1919: 150–151) said that the part of Dalmas’ collection that had not been destroyed by moths was purchased by Rothschild, except for the hummingbirds, which remained in Simon’s collection. It is possible that the types of this form are in ZSM.

Zimmer (1944: 10–16), in his discussion of this species did not treat the subspecies berlepschi , only listing specimens of it that he had examined; Tanagra berlepschi is now considered a subspecies of Thraupis episcopus (Dickinson, 2003: 807) .