472 



PERCHING BIRDS 



tail, the terminal portion of the tail-feathers being, however, crossed by 

 a black bar, while the white of their basal portion is interrupted by 

 the central pair, which are wholly black. In the adult male in spring 

 the upper-parts are mainly pearl-grey and the under-parts white ; 

 from the gape of the beak to the eye, and thence backwards, runs a 

 black stripe, expanding into an oval patch on the ear-coverts, and 

 above the stripe a narrow black line, while the wings are black. The 

 hen differs, so far as colour is concerned, by the absence of the black 

 head-stripe, and the brownish upper and buffish under parts. After 

 the autumn moult the feathers of the cock are broadly margined with 

 brown, thus concealing the black on the sides 

 of the head, and rendering the bird almost 

 indistinguishable from the hen ; and, as in the 

 case of the redstart, it is by the wearing away 

 of the dull outer margins of the feathers that 

 the full glories of the breeding- plumage are 

 revealed. Young birds are light greyish tinged 

 with brown above, and have brown tips to the 

 white upper tail -coverts ; the tail-feathers, as 

 in adult cocks, being also tipped with brown, 

 while the secondary quills carry broad brown 

 margins ; after the autumn moult these im- 

 mature birds become still more like the adult 

 females. 



The wheatear is, however, not only the typi- 

 cal representative of its genus, but it likewise 

 typifies the group of chats constituting the sub- 

 family Saxicolina.'. Structurally these birds come 

 very close to the redstart group (Ruticillin;e;, and their chief claim to 

 distinction appears to be based on their more flycatcher-like habits, all 

 these birds habitually perching on twigs, shrubs, rails, stones,or clods, from 

 which they make periodical sallies to capture their insect-prey on the 

 wing. Frequent jerking and spreading of the tail is very characteristic 

 of the chats ; and seasonal change in the colour of the plumage owing 

 to the wearing away of the margins of the feathers is a feature 

 common to this and the redstart group. As a rule, the sexes differ 

 markedly in colour ; and a further resemblance to the redstarts is 

 presented by the black legs, but, on the other hand, the tail is 

 never red, and the beak is longer. The majority of the species are 

 migrator)', sometimes, as in the present case, to a very marked degree. 

 They are, to a great degree, inhabitants of open and more or less 



WIIKATKAK (male). 



