122 SITTIDiE. 



B. Upper plumage slaty-blue ; crown black . . S. leucopsia leucopsis, 



C. Upper pinmagj? black, streaked with bril- [p. 130. 



liaut blue /.'. S. fonnosa, p. 131 . 



D. Upper plumage uniform purplish blue ; 



forehead black ,S'. frontalis frontalis, 



[p. 132. 



(108) Sitta himalayensis. 



The White-tailed Nuthatch. 



Sitta himulai/ensis Jard. & Selby, 111. Ind. Orn., iii, pL 144 (1835) ; 

 Blanf. & Gates, i, p. 300. 



Vernacular names. Siddiii-2}liip (Lepclia). 



Description.— Adult male. The forehead, lores, a streak behind 

 the eye, produced down the side of the neck to the shoulders, 

 black ; an indistinct eyebrow fulvous white ; upper plumage, 

 wing-coverts and inner secondaries dark slaty-blue, somewhat 

 paler on the ends ; primaries and outer secondaries dark brown 

 edged with sLaty-blue ; middle pair of tail-feathers slaty-blue, the 

 basal half of the inner vAeb and a band next the shaft on the outer 

 Aveb white ; the next two pairs wlioUy black; the next pair black 

 with an ashy tip ; the next black with an oblique white band and 

 an ashy tip, the outermost the same but with more white ; sides 

 of the face and chin pale fulvous ; lower plumage chestnut, richer 

 and deeper on the flanks and under tail-coverts ; under wing- 

 coverts black, a white patch on the base of tlie primaries showing 

 from below ordy. 



Adult female. Eesembles the male, but is rather duller and 

 paler. 



Colours of soft parts. Iris pale brcwn ; bill black, the gape and 

 base of lower mandible bluish white to pale slaty ; legs and feet 

 yellowish or olive-brown. 



Measurements. Length about 120 mm. ; wing 71 to 76 mm. ; 

 tail about 37 to 41 mm. ; tarsus about 17 to 18 mm. ; culmen about 

 14 to 15 mm. 



Distribution. Tlie Himalayas from Kaugra to Assam Nortii of 

 the Brahmaputra liiver, but in over tuenty years' collecting we 

 never found it South of the river, and there may be some mistake 

 in (jrodwin-Austen's record from Aimul in Manipur. 



Nidification. The White-tailed Nuthatch breeds in the 

 Himalayas from 5,000 feet to at least 11,000, at which height 

 Blanford procured it in Sikkim. It is a very early breeder, com- 

 mencing to lay in the first few days of April or even in the end 

 of March. The eggs are laid in some natural hollo^^' in a tree or 

 stump, the entrance being filled in neatly with mud so as to leave 

 only a small, quitecircular entrance, little over an inch in diameter. 

 The nest is a pad of moss, or moss and moss-roots with a depression 

 in the centre for the eggs. These number from four to six and are 

 white with numerous specks and spots of reddish, sometimes more 



