114 BULLETIN 186, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Family ROSTRATULIDAE 



ROSTRATULA BENGHALENSIS BENGHALENSIS (Linnaeus) 



Asiatic Painted Snipe 



[Rallus] benghalensis Linnaeus, Systerna naturae, ed. 10, vol. 1, 1758, p. 153 



(Asia). 

 Rostratula capensis, Gyldenstolpe, Journ. Nat. Hist. Soc. Siam, 1915, p. 236 



(listed) ; Kungl. Svenska Vet.-Akad. Handl., 1916, p. 147 (Khun Tan) ; Ibis, 



1920, p. 762 ("Northern Siam")." 

 Rostratula benghalensis benghalensis, Deignan, Journ. Siam Soc. Nat. Hist. Suppl., 



1931, p. 170 (Chiang Mai) ; 1936, p. 82 (Chiang Mai). 



At Chiang Mai the painted snipe occurred throughout the year but 

 was common and generally distributed only during the rains. Eisen- 

 hofer sent to Stockholm an undated male from Khun Tan. Otherwise, 

 it is definitely known only from Mae Sariang, where I took a male on 

 October 24, 1936, but the species will doubtless be found to occur in 

 all our provinces. 



In its choice of habitat and manner of flight, this bird closely re- 

 sembles a rail. It seems to be active chiefly at night, and during the 

 dry season I have found small flocks passing the day concealed under 

 some bush or clump of bamboo as much as a quarter of a mile from 

 the nearest water. The stomach of one of my specimens contained 

 gravel and a pellet of shot, of another a single snail. 



As is well known, in this species the roles of the sexes are completely 

 reversed, the larger and brighter female playing a dominant part in 

 all sexual matters and being promiscuous besides. With us, at least, 

 the males are greatly in excess of the females and there is apparently 

 no definite season for breeding, for I have taken birds with greatly 

 enlarged gonads on May 21 and October 7. 



Male specimens had the irides brown ; the bill fleshy brown, blackish 

 at the tip, greenish or slaty blue at the base of the mandible ; the feet 

 and toes slaty blue or green, tinged plumbeous ; the claws horny brown 

 or black. 



The adult male has the crown blackish, with a median stripe and a 

 short streak behind the eye buff ; some of the scapulars largely white, 

 forming a white line down either side of the back; the remaining 

 upperparts gray, barred with white and glossy olive-green ; the quills 

 ashy, barred with buff; the upper wing coverts olive-brown, barred 

 and spotted with black and buff; the neck and breast brown mottled 

 with white ; a patch of brown at each side of the belly separated from 

 the breast by a white band; the remaining underparts white. The 

 adult female has a white circle around the eye, continued as a streak 

 behind it ; the crown dark brown with a buff median stripe ; the throat 

 and f oreneck chestnut, continued as a band over the upper back ; the 

 remaining upperparts brownish, glossed with olive-green and narrowly 



