White-throated Jay

The white-throated jay is "the handsomest and most strikingly marked" member of genus Cyanolyca. It is 23 to 25 cm (9.1 to 9.8 in) long; three males weighed 50 to 54 g (1.8 to 1.9 oz). The sexes have the same plumage. Adults have a mostly black head, neck, and upper breast with a white throat and a thin white supercilium that continues around the back of the ear coverts almost to, but not joining, the white throat. The rest of their plumage is slate-blue with a greenish cast. The undersides of their wings are dark gray. They are believed to have a dark brown iris and known to have a black bill and black legs and feet. Immatures are duller overall than adults, with a greenish or bluish crown and nape and a shorter supercilium.

The white-throated jay has a disjunct distribution in southwestern Mexico. Its larger range is in the Sierra Madre del Sur and Sierra de Yucuyacua in Guerrero and northwestern Oaxaca states. A smaller range is in the Sierra de Miahuatlán in south-central Oaxaca. The species inhabits humid pine-oak forest and montane evergreen forest in the upper subtropical and temperate zones. It also occurs in coniferous forest. Overall its elevational range is about 1,800 to 3,500 m (5,900 to 11,500 ft) though in Oaxaca it is found mostly between 1,825 and 2,450 m (6,000 and 8,000 ft).

The white-throated jay apparently forages at all levels of the forest, and often in mixed-species feeding flocks of up to about eight individuals. Its diet and details of its foraging behavior are not known.