WA TTLE-BIRD 



T025 



Call^eas. (After Buller.) 



1788 by J. E. Forster {Enchiridion, p. 35) Callieas, and by Gmelin 

 {Syst. Nat i. p. 363) Glaiicopis} The Kokako of the Maories, it is 

 noAV commonly known as the Wattle-Crow, and two species are 

 recognized — the original C. or G. cinerea, belonging to the South 

 Island, and the C. or G. ivilsoni, which represents it in the North, 



almost the sole 

 difference between 

 them being the 

 colour of the bai"e 

 lobes or wattles 

 that depend from 

 the gape, which 

 in the latter are 

 wholly blue, but 

 in the former blue 

 at the base only, 

 the rest being 

 orange. The genus is usually placed in the Corvidx, but its fringed 

 and ciliated tongue, Avhich was duly noticed by the elder Forster, 

 and is figured, though very indistinctly, by Latham, tends to throw 

 doubt upon that assignment ; yet Dr. Gadow finds (cf. Buller, B. New 

 Zeal. ed. 2, p. 4) that osteologically it is one of the Amtrocoraces 

 or Noto-Coracomorphai {cf. Bird-of-Paradise, page 39, note ; Gymno- 

 RHINA, page 403; and Shrike, page 846, note). Both birds are 

 about as big as a Jay, of a dark ash-colour, inclining to brown beneath 

 and on the lower part of the back, and have the face black. They 

 feed mostly on berries, and are very locally distributed. The males, 

 in each species said to be smaller than the females, have loud and 

 varied notes, one of them of great depth and richness. 



The Wattle-birds of Australia and Tasmania belong to a very 

 different group, the Meliphagidai (Honey-eater). The first of them 

 was discovered at Port Jackson, 17th April 1788, and was de- 

 scribed in 1789 by Phillip (Boi Bay, p. 164), as also in the next 

 year by John White (Voy. New South JFcdes, p. 144), as a Bee-eater, 

 receiving from Latham the name of Merops caruncidatus. It is now 

 the Anthochxra carunculata of ornithology, and is widely distributed in 

 Australia, having a comparatively short red wattle hanging below the 

 eye, while a second species, A. incturis, is peculiar to Tasmania, and has 

 a much longer pendant, white at the root deepening into orange. 

 These birds are among the largest of the Meliphagidai, and have a 

 very inconspicuous plumage of dull brown streaked with white. 

 Allied to them are two other genera, Acanthogenys with a single 

 species, and AneUobium with two, the members of which are often 



^ Forster's preface is dated loth February, Gmelin's 16tli March. One can- 

 not but wish that priority of publication rests with the former, as one of the 

 discoverers of the bird. 



