It is mostly green with blue undertail coverts and white powder-puffs of downy feathers on the legs, and the male has a bluish-purple throat patch.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature believes it may be extinct, but there is a possibility that some individuals remain, so the bird has been rated as "critically endangered".

Graves (1996) assumed it could be a hybrid between E. vestita and an undetermined Eriocnemis species, while Ridgely (2001) suggested to see it as subspecies of the E.

Only the type specimen from 1850 has a known locality, it being from the Chillo valley, Guayllabamba plains, Ecuador, at an altitude between 2,100 and 2,300 m asl.

Two skins are simply labelled "Bogotá" – a common practice in the 19th century and not necessarily directly related to the actual locality where they were taken.