About Phaethornis guy (R.Lesson, 1833)
This species measures 13.5 cm (5.3 in) long and weighs 6.3 g (0.22 oz). The male is primarily dark green with a blue-green rump. It has a dark mask running through the eye, with buff stripes above and below the mask, and an additional buff stripe running down the center of the throat. For a large hermit hummingbird, the central feathers of its tapered tail are relatively short and tipped with white; males wiggle these tail feathers during displays at communal leks. The long, decurved bill of this species is reddish in color. Females have sooty gray underparts instead of green, and have an even longer bill and a much longer tail than males. The species' call is a loud zurk, and the lekking song sung by males is a repeated swark. Two subspecies are recognized: the nominate subspecies Phaethornis guy guy occurs in Venezuela and Trinidad, while the western subspecies P. g. apicalis, found along the American Cordillera, is slightly smaller and has greater similarity between the sexes. This hummingbird (a hermit) lives in forest undergrowth, most often near water, and prefers hilly landscapes. It favors primary rainforest and wet premontane forest, and while it can tolerate some degree of habitat disturbance such as subsistence farmland, it will avoid secondary forest when higher quality habitat is available. In the Colombian Cordillera Oriental, it has been recorded at altitudes between 650 and 1,750 m (2,130 and 5,740 ft) above sea level. Its habitat in this region typically has a canopy height around 25 m (82 ft), is dominated by trees like Elaeagia (in the Rubiaceae family) or palms, and usually has abundant undergrowth, epiphytes, or hemiepiphytes such as Clusiaceae.
