558 BULLETIN 186, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Uroloncha punctulata topela, de Schauensee, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Philadelphia, 

 1929, p. 559 (Chiang Mai, Chiang Saen). — Deignan, Journ. Siam Soc. Nat. 

 Hist. Suppl., 1931, p. 152 (Chiang Mai) ; 1936, p. 127 (Chiang Mai). 



Uroloncha punctulata subundtilata, de Schauensee, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phil- 

 adelphia, 1934, p. 235 (Chiang Mai, "Tung Sio"). 



The scaly-breasted munia is an abundant bird of open country 

 throughout the northern lowlands. 



Occurring in small parties on the lawns of parks and gardens and 

 in close flocks of hundreds in the ripening grainfields, this little weaver 

 is one of the most familiar of Thai species. "When frightened, the 

 band arises as one bird with unusually rapid wing beats and a musical 

 plink-plink, plink-plink (like the sound of tiny bells) to perch at the 

 top of some nearby clump of bushes until it is safe to resume their 

 gleaning. All stomachs examined by me contained the seeds of rice 

 and other grasses. 



The earliest date at which I have found the gonads active was May 8 

 (Chiang Mai), but most individuals breed in July and August during 

 the heavy rains. The nest is a large, globular structure of coarse grass 

 and lanceolate leaves with an entrance at one side, poorly made and 

 usually much fouled by its occupants, placed at heights between five 

 and twenty feet from the ground in shrubs, vines, and trees and so in- 

 securely attached that any good blow may bring it crashing down; 

 many come to grief even before the eggs are hatched and then the birds 

 immediately begin a new home as near as possible to the old location. 

 On July 5, 1930, one in my compound that had been fastened between 

 the trunk of a coconut and the base of a dead frond was carried away 

 by the falling leaf; it contained five young, one of which died during 

 the subsequent night, but the remaining four were seen next morning 

 fluttering about on the ground and attended by three adults. When 

 the nest outlasts the rainy season, it is regularly used as a sleeping 

 place by the family or families that have been bred therein ; one in a 

 small guava tree outside my window was so employed by six individ- 

 uals at least until mid-December, at which time I removed to another 

 part of the city. In northern Thailand, the juvenal dress seems to be 

 regularly held through the first winter and it is therefore interesting 

 to note that the few birds of the year seen from Bangkok are already 

 acquiring adult plumage early in their first autumn. 



Adults have the irides brownish red ; the maxilla slaty ; the mandible 

 plumbeous; the feet and toes plumbeous (the soles paler) ; the claws 

 plumbeous-horn. 



The adult of either sex has the feathers of the forehead, crown, 

 nape, mantle, and wings brown (brighter along the outer edges of the 

 primaries), with fine whitish shaft streaks; the feathers of the rump 

 more or less ashy and usually barred with whitish ; the upper tail cov- 



