24S THE BIKPS OF HEUGOL-A.XD 



73.— Dusky Thrush [Bkauxe Dbosskl]. 

 lURDUS FUSCATUS, PaUas. 



Turdus fustatui. P;.'. iit>*s.-Jsiai. L 451. 



Of tMs Siberi:\ii Thnish. too. so rarely met witli in Europe, inv 

 collection possesses a beautiiul specimen, a yoimg autmun bird in 

 fresh miinjured plumage. It was caught here in the throstle-bush 

 on the 10th of October ISSO. Ap-irc from this example, the fol- 

 lowing are fuUv-corroKirated records of its occurrence in Eiuvpe : 

 Bechstein, 1795 : Xavmiann, ISOi : GiglioU, Turin, 1S29 ; Brescia. 

 1S44: Genoa. lSt52 : Florence. 1S79. 



Further. Bi^ron de Selys Longchamps, is said to posses a Thrush 

 caught in Belgium, which was originally r^^arded as T. naumann% 

 but sutsequently proved to be T. fuscattis. 



It is. however, quite possible that a simUar confounding of 

 species may have occurred in regard to the Itahan examples, one 

 or other examples designated as T. fuscaius belonging really to 

 T. naumanni : for it is very siu'prising that this latter species also 

 has not been met with among other Siberi;\n Thrushes so nimier- 

 ously represented in Italy, especially as in the rest of Europe it has 

 occurred in vastly larger numbers than T.fuscatu^. Equally strange 

 is it to find, in GigUoh's Fauna Itaiica, how spiuingly Siberian 

 Leaf- Warblers and Bimtings are represented in Italy, as compared 

 with its richness in Siberian Thrushes. 



The example caught here has all its upper parts of a dusky 

 brown, somewhat similar to the colour of the bi\ck of the Fieldfivre 

 — a didl dusky ferruginous (^jxx^frofA) colour shining through on the 

 covered portions of the feathers. On the riunp this rust colour 

 becomes very distinct, but on the upper tail-coverts it is again 

 hidden by dusky edges. 



The flight- and tail-feathers are blackish, edged with the colour 

 of the back. In the tail-feathers, the edges towards the roots pass 

 into a dusky rust eoloiur ; the great wing-coverts as well as the 

 secondaries have dull, rust-coloured, well-defined edges, and the 

 former, like the posterior flight -feathers, have whitish tips. The 

 inn er wing-coverts and the inner webs of the flight-feathers are 

 whitish ferruginous {iceisslich-rosfix>th). 



A very broad, dull yellowish white eye-streak runs from the 

 nostril to and beyond the ear-coverts ; the sides of the neck and 



