Lesser Violetear

About the Lesser Violetear

The lesser violetear (Colibri cyanotus), also known as the mountain violet-ear, is a medium-sized, metallic green hummingbird species commonly found in forested areas from Costa Rica south to the Andes and Argentina and east to Venezuela. This species and the Mexican violetear were formerly considered as conspecific and named the 'green violetear'.

Like all hummingbirds, the lesser violetear belongs to the order Apodiformes. Hummingbirds share this order with the swifts, such as the white-collared swift. The name Apodiformes is derived from the Greek words "a pous", meaning "without foot". While apodiforms do in fact have feet, they are quite small and their legs are short and relatively weak. Many birds in this order cannot walk, and thus rarely if ever land on the ground since quick escape from predators is virtually impossible. For this reason members of this order spend a majority of their time in the air.

The lesser violetear has four sub-species: C. c. cabanidis (Heine), 1863) - Costa Rica, western Panama C. c. crissalis Todd, 1942 - Peru and Bolivia C. c. cyanotus (Bourcier, 1843) - Colombia, northwestern Venezuela, Ecuador

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