1917-] ^11' i^i^i'ds of the Suez Canal Zone. 539 



XXVIII. — Birds of the Suez Canal Zone and Sinai Peninsula. 

 By Captain A. W. Boyd, M.C. 



Shortly after the outbreak of war I was stationed in Cairo, 

 where I had the good fortune to meet Mr. J. L. Bonhote 

 and Mr. M. J. NicoU, and from them to learn to distinguish 

 many of the local hirds very much more quickly than 1 could 

 possibly have done unaided ; so many of tlie species were 

 entirely new to me that without their assistance I should 

 have been unable to compile even so incomplete a list as this. 



After the Gallipoli campaigu we returned to Egypt, and 

 were there till February 1917: first on and about the Canal, 

 laul later in various places along the north Sinai road from 

 Kautara to El Arish. 



In this paper 1 propose to deal only with the birds seen 

 after our return in 191(3 up to February 1917. Very many 

 interesting species noted near Alexandria and Cairo were 

 never seen further east : the Great Spotted Cuckoo, the 

 Glossy Ibis, Spoonbill, Pratincole, Black-tailed God wit, 

 Marsh and Wood Sandpipers, Black-winged Stilt, and very 

 many other interesting birds which 1 saw near Cairo (in 

 some cases in large flocks), were never seen near the Canal ; 

 the same applies to the common spring warblers sucii as 

 Riippell's, Bonelli's, the Olivaceous and Subalpine Warblers, 

 and many other species. I did not even see the abundant 

 little Warblei' of the Delta, Friiiia gracilis, and have no note 

 of the occurrence of the Palm-Uove [Turtus senegaletisis), nor 

 of the Hooded Crow (Corvus curnix)^ though doubtless all 

 three will occur in some of the cultivated land near Ismailia 

 or Suez. More strange perhaps was the entire absence, so far 

 as I could judge, of any species of Amniomanes, the Desert 

 Larks, which I often saw near Cairo and which might surely 

 have been expected to be plentiful enough. 



During the spring migration of 1916 I unfortunately had 

 little time for observation, and many species must have 

 passed through unseen ; but in the autumn I had rather 



