( •^4) 



NOTE OX THE LOXOFS OF OAHU. 

 By the HON. WALTER ROTHSCHILD. 



WHEN H. Palmer sent me a sjiecimen of a Loxops from Oahii I named it 

 Loxops wohtenholmei (Ihis, 1 .sOI5,i)!ige oTO), thus distinguishing it from 

 L. wr«»m of the island of Hawaii. In doing so I was right, as specimens from 

 Oahu, colleoted t)}' Deppe, in the Museums of Berlin and of (xraf Berlepsch, whicli 

 were examined by Mr. Hartert and myself, undoubtedly show. However, I was 

 misled by Mr. Scott B. Wilson (Ares Hawfiiienses, Part I., ls9U) to believe that 

 no red Loxops were found on Oahu, and that all the specific names belonged to the 

 Hawaii form. After having examined the types of Bloxam's Fringilla rufa in the 

 British Museum, and those collected during the voyage of the Sulphur (wliich most 

 probably came from Oahn, as seen from the account of the voyage), 1 found that tliey 

 all belonged to the Oahu species, and therefore the name of Loxops rufa (Blox.) 

 must, I am sorry to say, stand for the Oahu bird, and my L. icolstenholnm is a 

 synonym, while we may accept L. cocehiea (Gm.) for the Hawaii species. 



Tins will be more exjjlicitly explained in tlie third part of my work on the 

 liirds of the Sandwich Islands. 



It is cnrions that none of the recent authors ("see Sharpe, Wilson, Gadow) 

 mentioned the curious bUl of Loxops, in whicli tlie mandible is turned towards 

 the side, as if to cross the maxilla, a character already expressed in the very 

 name of the genus. 



FURTHEE NOTES ON THE HOUBARA BUSTARD. 



Bv THE HON. WALTER ROTHSCHILD and ERNST HARTERT. 



SINCE writing on the differences of the Houbara bustards from Tunis and 

 Fuertaventura (Novitates Zoologicae, I., p. 689) we have seen additional 

 birds which prove that our ideas of their differences are quite right, and that they 

 really differ a great deal in the shade of colour and markings, but that tlie number 

 of the bands across the tail is quite tariabli', and must therefore be left out of 

 consideration, though nevertheless they are apparently broader in the Fuertaventura 

 bird, and there is more blackish mottling between the dark bars. 



Mr. Mcade-Waldo told Mr. Hartert that these bustards are sometimes seen to 

 cross over the sea from the Morocco coast to the island of Fuertaventura, and 

 therefore our Houbara fuertaventurae must also inhabit parts of Morocco, a country 

 which is as yet ornithologically very little known. It is also found in Lanzarote. 



