The short-tailed nighthawk (Lurocalis semitorquatus) is a species of nightjar in the family Caprimulgidae. It is found in Mexico, in every Central American country except El Salvador, in Trinidad and Tobago, and in every mainland South American country except Chile and Uruguay. Taxonomy The short-tailed nighthawk was formally described in 1789 by the German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin in his revised and expanded edition of Carl Linnaeus's Systema Naturae. He placed it with all the nightjars in the genus Caprimulgus and coined the binomial name Caprimulgus semitorquatus. Gmelin based his description on "Le petit egoulevent tacheté de Cayenne" that had been described in 1779 by the French polymath Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon in his Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux. A hand-coloured plate was published separately. The short-tailed nighthawk is now placed with the rufous-bellied nighthawk in the genus Lurocalis that was introduced in 1851 by the American ornithologist John Cassin. The genus name combines the Ancient Greek oura meaning "tail" with kolos meaning "stunted". The specific epithet semitorquatus combines the Latin semi- meaning "half-" or "small" with torquatus meaning "collared". Four subspecies are recognised: L. s. stonei Huber, 1923 – southeast Mexico to northwest Ecuador L. s. semitorquatus (Gmelin, JF, 1789) – north Colombia to the Guianas and north Brazil, Trinidad and Tobago L. s. schaeferi Phelps & Phelps Jr, 1952 – Aragua (north Venezuela) L. s. nattererii (Temminck, 1822) – Amazonia south of the Amazon to north Argentina Subspecies L. s. nattereri has been suggested as a separate species, but genetic data confirm its present status. A previously recognized subspecies, L. s. noctivagus, was merged into L. s. stonei. The rufous-bellied nighthawk (L. rufiventris) was formerly treated as a subspecies of short-tailed nighthawk, and the two of them are the only members of genus Lurocalis. Description The short-tailed nighthawk is long. One L. s. semitorquatusfemale weighed and several L. s. nattereri males weighed . This is a rather large nightjar with an unusually short tail. Its upperparts are dark brown to blackish with rufous and buff spots and speckles. The wings are also dark brown with muted spots of several colors, an unlike most other nighthawks, do not have bold white markings. The tail is brown with tawny or grayish bars and a narrow buffy or whitish band at the end. The chin is dark brown, the throat white, the upper breast dark brown with lighter speckles, the lower