Elegant Euphonia, Chlorophonia elegantissima

Elegant Euphonia, Chlorophonia elegantissima rileyi, Male. Photograph taken within a residential community in Alamos, Sonora, February 2018. Photograph and identification courtesy of David F Smith, Alamos, Sonora.

The Elegant Euphonia, Chlorophonia elegantissima rileyi, is one of three subspecies of Elegant Euphonia, two of which are found in Mexico. They are a member of the Fringillidae Family of Finches, Euphonias, and Allies, which has two hundred forty-nine members placed in forty-nine genera, and one of eight global species of the Chlorophonia Genus. They are known in Mexico as Eufonia Capucha-azul.

The Elegant Euphonia are very small in stature. They are sexually dimorphic with the females having a blue crown. The males have a bright blue crown and orange-rufous underparts. The females have a rufous forehead, bright sky-blue crown and nape, blue curling down the down the side of the neck behind the ear coverts, olive sides to their heads, bright olive-green upperparts and upperwing-coverts with dusky flight feathers and a dark olive-green tail; their throat is washed in cinnamon transitioning to yellowish-olive on the breast and sides and greenish-yellow bellies and undertail coverts. The males have a rufous forehead bordered with a thin black line, a turquoise-blue crown and nape and blue extending down the side of the neck behind the ear coverts, sides of the head and throat black, glossy purplish black upperparts, upperwing coverts, flight feathers and tails; their underparts are tawny-orange, and their underwing coverts are white. Their bills are small and black in color with a grayish lower mandible base, their iris is dark brown, and their legs are dusky gray.

The Elegant Euphonia is typically found within open pine–oak woodland, oak scrub, borders of broadleaf evergreen forest, and plantations, and in scattered trees in clearings near forest at elevations between 500 m (1,640 feet) and 2,500 m (8,200) feet. Northern birds are known to make southern migrations during the coldest months and are found at lower elevations when they are not breeding. They feed almost entirely on the small soft berries of mistletoe. They are found in pairs, small groups of up to ten individuals. They roost in dense quarters in groups of fifty individuals in close quarters and disperse at dawn.

The Elegant Euphonia is a year-round resident of Mexico being found in northwest, western and central Mexico from Sinaloa south to Guanajuato and Nuevo Leon and within the mountains south to Belize and Guatemala. The rileyi subspecies is limited to northwest Mexico in the states of Sonora and Sinaloa.

The Elegant Euphonia is very similar to the Antillean Euphonia, Chlorophonia musica, and the Golden-rumped Euphonia, Chlorophonia cyanocephala, which are found in the Caribbean and South America.

From a conservation perspective the Elegant Euphonia is currently considered to be of Least Concern with stable, widely distributed populations.