BIRDS OF ETHIOPIA AND KENYA COLONY 145 



The white-winged cliff-chat inhabits the highlands of Ethiopia, 

 where it ranges from the neighborhood of Lake Tsana south to the 

 Sidamo country and to Djamdjam in Shoa. It is more of a highland 

 bird than T. cinncmionieiventns alhiscapuJafa, although the two do 

 overlap in range. Von Heuglin ^® writes that he found it from 5,000 

 to 8,000 feet above the sea, in the eastern and central parts of Ethi- 

 opia, and as high as 12,000 feet in Gallaland. Erlanger " found it 

 in Arussi-Gallaland and between Harrar and Adis Abeba. It was 

 nowhere abundant, being seen in pairs as a rule. On the other hand, 

 Neumann '® found it very abundant at altitudes of from 2,600 to 3,100 

 meters. 



The three females are quite different infer se. One of them, ap- 

 parently the youngest of the three (all of which are fully grown, not 

 obviously juvenal), has the feathers of the nape, scapulars, inter- 

 scapulars, and back dark grayish brown barred with fuscous-black; 

 the rump and upper tail coverts tawny, barred with black; the entire 

 underparts, except the rufous under tail coverts and the extreme 

 caudal part of the middle of the abdomen, dusky tawny-buff heavily 

 banded with black. There is a tawny-yellowish stripe down the 

 iniddle of the throat. The female from Aletta is similar but has the 

 upperparts solid black (quite glossy on the head) and has the breast 

 and upper abdomen darker than in the first mentioned one (from 

 Adis Abeba), but this difference may be due to wear, as the Aletta 

 bird is abraded and the Adis Abeba example is not so much so. 

 Finally, the third one, also from Adis Abeba, is solid black above, 

 but has the middle of the abdomen anterior practically to the poste- 

 rior margin of the breast, dark bright rufous as in the male. Like 

 the Aletta bird, the thighs are black (they are barred buff and black 

 in the youngest of the three specimens). 



Ogilvie-Grant ^^ found that a — 



* * * young male from Abyssinia * * * in the British Museum col- 

 lection, with the upper parts and breast still partially in the spotted nestling- 

 plumage, is moulting direct into the plumage of the adult male— the lower 

 breast, belly and under tail coverts having already become nearly uniform 

 rufous-chestnut, while many feathers of the upper parts, throat, and upper 

 breast are deep black. This bird shows no trace of the rufous patch down the 

 middle of the throat. It seems probable, therefore, that though the females 

 ultimately become similar in plumage to the adult male, they do not attain the 

 adult plumage at the tirst moult * * * an intermediate dress, in which the 

 breast and belly are dusky rufous-buff indistinctly barred with black, being 

 ^orn for at least a year. 



I rather doubt whether the female becomes similar to the adult male, 

 as no other forms of this group exhibit such sexual similarity in 



''^ Ornithologie Nordost-Afrika's, etc., vol. 1, p. 369, 1869. 

 " Journ. fiir Orn., 1905, p. 744. 

 ■^ Journ. fiir Orn., 1906, p. 288. 

 ''»Ibis, 1900, p. 170. 



