Lovely Cotinga

The lovely cotinga is 18 to 20 cm (7.1 to 7.9 in) long and weighs 66 to 75 g (2.3 to 2.6 oz). The sexes are dramatically dimorphic. Adult males have rich bright blue upperparts whose color is slightly deeper on the crown. Their wings' lesser and median coverts are the same bright blue. Their greater coverts, primaries, secondaries, and tertials are black with blue or greenish blue edges. Their tail is black with greenish blue or bluish green edges on the feathers; the uppertail coverts are long and cover the base of the tail. The lower part of their face is glossy purplish black and their chin, throat, and upper breast are dark purple. Their lower breast, flanks, and undertail coverts are the same rich bright blue as their upperparts but for an oval patch of rich purple on the belly. Adult females have mostly dark grayish brown upperparts with whitish feather tips that produce a scalloped appearance. Their wings are mostly dusky grayish brown with usually a greenish tinge on the lesser and median coverts. Their greater coverts and flight feathers have pale grayish brown or buffy edges. Their tail is dusky grayish brown with thin green or greenish gray feather edges. Their underparts are mostly dull white with dusky grayish brown spots that are heaviest on the breast and sides and diminish elsewhere. …

The lovely cotinga is found in southern Mexico from southern Veracruz across northern Oaxaca and Chiapas south of the Yucatán Peninsula. Its range continues south along the Caribbean through southern Belize and northern Guatemala and northern Honduras and further inland on the Caribbean slope through Nicaragua and Costa Rica. There are also sight records in Panama and on the Pacific side of Costa Rica. It inhabits the tropical zone, where it is found in the interior and edges of lowland evergreen forest and also more open areas with scattered trees. In elevation it ranges from sea level to 1,500 m (4,900 ft) in Mexico and northern Central America and reaches 1,700 m (5,600 ft) in Costa Rica.

The lovely cotinga's diet is not well known, but is thought to be primarily fruits and also includes invertebrates and occasionally small vertebrates like lizards. It typically forages singly or in pairs but "larger numbers may congregate in fruiting trees". It forages mostly in the canopy, where it perches in the open on bare branches and makes short sallies to pluck fruit or insects.