638 Letters, Extracts, and Nutes. [Ibis, 



Alexandra Parrakeet^s primaries nor of the different sliade 

 of the rump and crown of the head. The females of all 

 Platycercus and Barnardius Parrakeets are inferior to adult 

 males of the same race in the size of the head and beak, and 

 some are duller in colour and slightly different in markings. 

 The latter peculiarity is only noticed in the case of P. flavi- 

 ventris, where, curiously enough, it is least obvious. 



The statement that the adult female Stanley (yellow- 

 cheeked) Parrakeet resembles the male is quite incorrect. 

 The female differs from all other PJatycerci in retaining all 

 her life a plumage very similar to that of the young. 

 I must have seen nearly four dozen Stanleys, and have 

 kept them and bred them for years. I may say here that 

 I do not believe any Platycercine Parrakeet takes more 

 than fourteen months to assume adult plumage : all that 

 T have had, imported or home-bred, caged or free, have 

 assumed full colour with the first complete moult and have 

 not altered perceptibly afterwards. There is often, how- 

 ever, a considerable modification of the nestling plumage 

 before the first complete moult, which begins about twelve 

 months from the time the bird left the nest. Black 

 Cockatoos do, however, take about four years to attain 

 the adult dress. Two males of the small western race 

 of the Banksian, which came into my possession three years 

 ago, passed through various phases of plumage. On arrival 

 they were spotted on the head and shoulders, and their 

 tail-bars were yellow and freckled with black. In the next 

 phase the spots were fewer and the tail-bars entirely red 

 with black freckles. In the last, previous to the assumption 

 of full adult dress, the black freckling disappeared entirely 

 from the tail and only a very few spots persisted on the 

 shoulders. A young female of the same age as the males 

 closely resembled them at first, though they were always 

 a little darker. Her yellow markings are now much 

 brighter than they were, and I should say she was in 

 adult dress quite twelve months before her companions. 



The classification of Platycercus aclelaidce as merely a 

 local race of Platycercus elegans seems hardly justifiable, 



