Wedge-tailed Sabrewing

About the Wedge-tailed Sabrewing

The wedge-tailed sabrewing (Pampa curvipennis) is a species of hummingbird in the "emeralds", tribe Trochilini of subfamily Trochilinae. It is found in Belize, Guatemala, Mexico, and possibly Honduras. Two subspecies have sometimes been treated as separate species, the curve-winged sabrewing and the long-tailed sabrewing.

The wedge-tailed sabrewing was formally described in 1830 under the binomial name Trochilus curvipennis by the German accountant Wilhelm Deppe in a price list of specimens that had been collected in Mexico by Wilhelm's brother Ferdinand Deppe. The specific epithet combines the Latin curvus meaning "curved" with -pennis meaning "-winged". The wedge-tailed sabrewing is now placed with the rufous sabrewing in the genus Pampa that was introduced in 1854 by German naturalist Ludwig Reichenbach.

This species was formerly placed in the genus Campylopterus. A molecular phylogenetic study published in 2014 found that the genus Campylopterus was polyphyletic. In the revised classification to create monophyletic genera, the wedge-tailed sabrewing was moved to the resurrected genus Pampa.

Three subspecies are recognised: P. c. curvipennis (Deppe, W, 1830) – southwestern... Wikipedia →