PORPHYROCKl'lIALUS, 4 ■! •'] 



irith irliile ; forfhuwl, cruirn of the liewl and uaiir <lr,'p lannxjn-re.d : rlipel;^ f/renn tin<ieil ir'dh i/elluK,', 

 and passing into grefuish-yeUow on the sidi's of thi> nfii-k : furp-nfck, bivast and abdomen riolet-blne ; 

 thighs and nnder fail-coverts red. Total length l.'f.'i inchi's, iring C-.:, tail S, bill (>0, tarsns 0-7.'i. 



Adult FKMALK. — Similar to the male, but sHghtlg smaller and. dnJIer in colonr. Wing (r t 

 iiiclies. 



Distiihiition. — Western Australia. 



(ft^LTHOljGH the Northern Territory and Morth-western Austraha have been included in 

 -^ ^ the habitat of the present species, after exaniinint; many collections made in all parts 

 of Australia for more than a ijuarter of a century, I have never seen or heard of a specimen 

 froin anywhere but the south-western portion of Western Australia. If it does occur in North- 

 western .Australia at all, it must be in extremely limited numbers over a circumscribed range of 

 country. Mr. Tom Carter, during a seventeen yeais residence there, never met with it, neither 

 was it contained in the large collections made in that part of the continent by the late Mr. T. II. 

 Bowyer-Bower and Mr. K. J. Cairn, in the vicinity of Derby, and by Mr. G. /\. Keartland near 

 the junction of the Fitzroy and Margaret Kivers. Gould, who figures it in his folio edition of 

 "The Birds of .Australia," under the name of Platyccnns pihatus, gives Western Australia as 

 its habitat, but in his " Handbook to the Birds of Australia," f where he refers to it as Piiypimi- 

 ceplialus pilcatiis, adds: — "I have also received specimens from the neighbourhood of Port 

 Essington." Evidently they were wrongly localised, for there is no properly authenticated 

 record of a specimen being obtained in the Northern Territory since. 



.All the specimens in the .Australian Museum were procured in South-western Australia, 

 and by far the greater number of them by the late Mr. George Masters at King George Sound. 



From Broome Hill, South-western Australia, Mr. Tom Carter has kindly favoured me with 

 the following notes :— " The Red-capped Parrakeet (Poifhyyoccphalns spurius) is distributed 

 throughout South-western .Australia, but cannot be called numerous. It does not go in flocks 

 like Bavnardiiis seiiiiton/uatiis or Plalycercus ictcrotis, but is mostly seen in pairs or a small family 

 party soon after the young are fledged. I have seen a good many on the Blackwood River, shot 

 in company with Bai'naidins semitofqiiatus, while eating fruit in orchards. These birds occur 

 round .Albany, Denmark and the extreme south-western corner, and also about Broome Hill, 

 where they live a good deal in the Mallee timber (Eiualyptus oaidcufalis) and Marlock scrub 

 east of the Great Southern Fvailway. They feed much on the ground, and are shy in habit. 

 Their cry is a harsh rasping noise. I have never taken their eggs, but on the 26th October, 

 1908, I was shewn a nesting cavity about four inches in diameter, and thirty feet from the ground, 

 in a very large green tree, which apparently contained young birds. On the 24th November, 

 1908, this same tree was felled, and one fresh egg was broken in the fall. Perhaps it was a 

 second laying. On the same date a tree containing a nest with half-grown young was felled. 

 On the nth September, 1910, I shot a female with ovaries enlarged, as if nearly ready to lay. 

 On the 2gth September of the same year I saw almost Hedged young in a nest forty miles south- 

 east of Broome Hill." 



Mr. Thos. P. .Austin, of Cobborah Station, has a set of eggs in his collection taken for him 

 by Mr. Thos. Burns, on the 6th November, 1912, on the Kalgan River, Western Australia, the 

 nesting hollow being thirty feet from the ground, and the eggs three feet down from the entrance. 

 The eggs are five in number, rounded in form, pure white, except where slightly nest stained 

 from laying on the decaying wood, the shell being close-grained and slightly glossy. They 

 measure:— Length (A) 1-03 x 0-9 inches; (B) 1-05 x 0-89 inches; (C) 1-05 x 089 inches; 

 (D) roi X 0-88 inches; (E) 1-03 x o-8S inches. 



Gould, Bds. Austr., fol. ed. Vol. V., pi. 32 (184S). t Handbk Bds. Austr., Vol. I,, p. 60 (1S65I. 



