Snowy cotinga
species of bird

The snowy cotinga (Carpodectes nitidus) is a medium-sized species of passerine bird in the family Cotingidae. It is found in Costa Rica, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama.
Taxonomy and systematics
The snowy cotinga shares genus Carpodectes with the yellow-billed cotinga (C. antoniae) and the black-tipped cotinga (C. hopkei). One early twentieth century author treated them as conspecific but they have been otherwise treated as separate species. The three form a superspecies. The snowy cotinga is monotypic.
Description
The snowy cotinga is 19.5 to 21 cm (7.7 to 8.3 in) long and weighs an average of 105 g (3.7 oz). The species is sexually dimorphic. Adult males are mostly white with a light bluish gray crown and a very light bluish gray wash on their upperparts and wings. Their flight feathers are wide and have rounded tips.
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This entry incorporates text from “Snowy cotinga” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.