162 BULLETIN 15 3, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



' Soft parts ; Iris, hazel brown ; distal half of bill and the claws, 

 black ; proximal half of bill, the tibiae, and the feet, red. 



In studying the variations of the crowned plover I have assembled 

 a series of 70 specimens from Ethiopia, British Somaliland, Kenya 

 Colony, Uganda, Tanganyika Territory, and South Africa. As 

 already reported on " the examination of this material shows there 

 are three distinct forms of this species — a large, northeastern high- 

 land race {syspicaoa) , and two smaller ones, one of which, occurring 

 in Somaliland (demissus), has the upper parts sandy rufous in fresh 

 plumage, the other (typical coronafus), inhabiting the lower parts of 

 East Africa and South Africa, has darker, more grayish-brown, 

 upper parts. It is quite likely that the birds of South West Africa 

 will prove to be a fourth race, as they are said to be paler, and more 

 sandy hued, than typical coronatus. 



Inasmuch as the original paper in which I described suspicax and 

 demissus may not be available to as large a coterie of investigators as 

 the present report, I shall here repeat some of the statements first 

 made there. 



Erlanger '^ noticed that Somaliland birds were more sandy- 

 yellowish in color above than East African examples, but felt that 

 the difference was unimportant. Zedlitz ^* found that the Somali- 

 land specimens were very pale, like those of southwest Africa, but 

 more rufescent, less grayish. He also noted that the largest birds 

 in this series came from Ethiopia, but that the size difference between 

 them and more southern birds was not constant. Gyldenstolpe '^^ 

 studied the size variations of this plover and decided that dimensions 

 were not reliable as taxonomic characters. However, he did not 

 differentiate between the sexes when tabulating his data. Likewise, 

 no indication was given of the altitudes from which the birds came. 

 I find that these two factors, sex and altitude, are important and 

 provide a key to the rather complex variations of this species. The 

 birds of Ethiopia are large and form a perfectly recognizable race 

 based on size, but the difference between them and more southern 

 birds is best marked in the males and not at all well shown in thft 

 females. Also, the large northern birds occur farther south 

 (toward the Equator, not farther south from the Equator) in very 

 high localities, such as Mau, Kenya Colony (9,000 feet or 2,700 

 meters). In other words, the large form is not wholly Abyssinian 

 (although chiefly represented in collections by specimens from 

 Ethiopia), but an eastern highland race with its center of abun- 

 dance in the northern part of its range. This form, S. c. suspicax, 



■" Proc. N. Eng. Zool. CI., vol. 10, Nov., 1928, pp. 91-97. 



''s.Tourn. f. Ornith., 1905, pp. 65-66. 



" Idem, 1914, pp. 628-629. 



"sKungl. Sv. Vet. Akad. llandlgr., 1924, pp. 200-201. 



