The narrow strip of the Pacific coastal plain and adjoining foothills of Chiapas state (Mexico), Guatemala, El Salvador, southern Honduras and north-west Nicaragua form this EBA, on the Pacific slope of the Sierra Madre mountains. The coastal plain of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec (EBA 014) is located at its northern end, and the highlands of the Sierra Madre de Chiapas and Guatemala (which are part of the North Central American highlands, EBA 018) run parallel to it.

There are a variety of habitats in the EBA, including mangroves along much of the coastline, semi-evergreen humid forest, tropical deciduous forest and thorn woodland.

All the restricted-range species inhabit tropical deciduous and semi-evergreen humid forest, but they show different distributions, with Campylorhynchus chiapensis being found only in the northern part of the EBA in Chiapas, while the remaining species occur throughout it. The southern range of Ortalis leucogastra is taken as northern Nicaragua. Some authors, however, consider the isolated population of Ortalis in the Nicoya peninsula of Costa Rica to be this species, but Delacour and Amadon (1973) and Stiles and Skutch (1989) place this population under the widespread Plain Chachalaca O. vetula.

There are two subspecies of Amazilia cyanura, which are as distinct from each other as are many recognized species of hummingbird. A. c. guatemalae is confined to south-east Chiapas and Guatemala where it ranges from 100 to 1,800 m, while the nominate form occurs in eastern El Salvador, southern Honduras and north-west Nicaragua from sea-level to 1,200 m (Howell and Webb 1995a). However, the species may well be shown to be an altitudinal migrant breeding only below 1,000 m. There are also a couple of records of the nominate race from central Honduras, which suggests that it might have a larger range stretching further north into the interior of Honduras. A. c. guatemalae probably overlaps with some of the species occurring around 1,000-1,500 m on the Pacific slope in the Sierra Madre of Chiapas, Mexico and Sierra Madre of Guatemala (North Central American highlands, EBA 018, in part).

Much of the coastal plain of this EBA is under cultivation, especially banana, cocoa and coffee plantations and cattle-ranching. None of the species is, however, considered to be threatened, as they have all been found in degraded habitats and appear to be fairly common.

There are a number of protected areas that embrace, at least in part, the distributions of the restricted-range species: La Encrucijada Natural and Typical Biotope Reserve (20 km²), Mexico; Monterrico Biotope Reserve (28 km²), Guatemala; El Imposible National Park (39 km²) and Barra de Santiago Wildlife Refuge, El Salvador (22 km²); Volcán Cosiguina National Nature Reserve (124 km²), Estero Real National Nature Reserve (387 km²) and Padre Ramos Nature Reserve (48 km²), Nicaragua.

Recommended citation
BirdLife International (2024) Endemic Bird Area factsheet: North Central American Pacific slope. Downloaded from https://datazone.birdlife.org/eba/factsheet/15 on 23/11/2024.