160 :\IAXUAL OF PHILIPPINE BIRDS. 



133. DISSOURA EPISCOPUS (Boddaeit). 



WHITE-NECKED STORK. 



Ardea episcopus Boddaekt, Tabl. PI. Enl. (1783), 54. 



Dissura episcopus Sharpe, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus. ( 1898) . 26, 21)4; Blaxford, 



Fauna Brit. Ind. Bds. (1898), 4, 370, fig. 87. 

 Dissoura episcopus Sharpe, Hand-List (1899), 1, 190; Gates, Cat. Birds' 



Eggs (1902), 2, 105; McGregor and Worcester, Hand-List (1906), 31. 



Basilan (McGregor) ; Bohol (Steere) ; Calayan (McGregor) ; Leyte (Everett) ; 

 Luzon (Heriot, Whitehead) ; ilarinduque (Worcester) ; Masbate (Bourns d- Wor- 

 cester) ; Mindanao (Everett, Celestino. Goodfellow) ; Mindoro [Bourns <£- Worces- 

 ter, McGregor) ; Xegros (Steere, Bourns d- Worcester, Whitehead. Keay) ; Panay 

 I Bourns d Worcester) ; Samar (Whitehead) . Tropical Africa, Indian and Malay 

 Peninsulas, Indo-Malay Islands, Indo-Chinese countries, Celebes, Ceylon. 



''Adult male. — Above black, glossed with metallic green and purple, 

 more especially on hind neck; entire back and upper tail-coverts glossed 

 with metallic green: tail-feathers black, not to be confounded with the 

 under tail-coverts, which are white; the outer retrices black, graduated, 

 and forming a fork; wing-coverts like the back, but more distinctly 

 glossed, especially on the lesser series, which are metallic purplish red ; 

 quills black, glossed with slaty externally and with metallic green on 

 the inner face of all the quills, crown of head blue-black as far as occiput ; 

 nape and entire neck white as well as the throat; chin less thickly 

 clothed with feathers; breast black, slightly glossed with metallic green, 

 but more strongly with reddish purple, especially on the fore neck and 

 chest; abdomen and under tail-coverts white, the long ones stiffened and 

 resembling tail-feathers ; axillars and under wing-coverts black with a gloss 

 of metallic green. 'Bill in general black, tinged with red on culmen, 

 tips, and margins ; legs and l^es red ; claws reddish horn-color ; iris crim- 

 son; eyelids and facial skin plumbeous.' (Oates.) Length, about 915; 

 culmen, 914; wing, 508; tail, 183; tarsus, 179. 



"Adult female. — Similar to the male. 'Iris very pale, almost whitisli 

 hue.' [H. J. Rainey.) Length, 91-4 : culmen, 145 ; wing, 470 ; tail, 183 ; 

 tarsus, 157. 



"Young birds differ from the adults in being much browner and not 

 having so much gloss, the black feathers on the head being replaced by 

 bronzy brown, the purplish gloss on the wing-coverts almost absent, and 

 the purple gloss on the breast being replaced by dull bronzy brown. The 

 forehead generally shows a basal line of white feathers, but these are also 

 apparent in some of the old birds, and are apparently shed by them in 

 course of time." (Sharpe.) 



Specimens obtained in Mindoro liave an unfeathered band along the 

 under side of the forearm. The skin of this space is dark crimson. 



"Eather rare and very shy. Usually seen soaring at great heights. 

 Occasionally met with perching on dead trees, or wading sibout the rice- 

 fields." (Bourns and Worcester MS.) 



