THE IBIS. 



NINTH SERIES. 



No. XI. JULY 1909. 



XVIII. — Contributions to the Ornithology of the Sudan. — 

 No. IV.^ On Birds observed on the Red Sea Coast in May 

 1908. By A. L. Butler, F.Z.S., M.B.O.U., Superin- 

 tendent of Game Preservation, Sudan Government. 



I SPENT the month of May in 1908 on the Red Sea coast in 

 the vicinity of Port Sudan, and the ornithological notes then 

 made form the subject of this paper. The dates on which 

 migratory birds were met with were carefully recorded daily. 

 The great number of Blackcaps, Garden -Warblers, and 

 Barred Warblers seen was remarkable, and the main line of 

 migration of these three species seems, in the Sudan, to lie 

 along the Red Sea coast. None of them is ever abundant 

 at Khartoum, and I often saw more of them in half an hour 

 than I have seen in eight years in the Nile Valley. I was 

 surprised to find them still in such numbers in Africa late 

 in May. Possibly these late individuals are the birds from 

 the most northern parts of the range of the species. 



Port Sudan lies about forty miles north of Suakin. A flat 

 scrub-covered plain extends from the sea to the ranges of 

 barren mountains twenty or twenty-five miles inland, sandy 

 near the coast, and becoming stony as the hills are neared. 

 Through these rocky hills runs a narrow valley known as the 

 Khor Arbat, in which is that delightful rarity in the Sudan, 

 a permanent flowing stream. This loses itself in the sands of 

 the plain shortly after emerging from the hills. I found the 



• See ' The Ibis,' 1905, p. 301, 1908, p. 206, and 1909, p. 74. 



SER. IX, VOL. III. 2 D 



