478 BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 



Genus OCEANITES, Keyserling et Blasius. 



Two or three species of this genus are all that are known. 

 Modern research tends to prove that the Australian bird, 

 which I believed to be identical with the American 0. loilsoni, 

 is distinct from that bird, and that it is identical with the 

 Procellaria oceanica of Banks, a view which I here adopt. 



Sp. 646. OCEANITES OCEANICA. 



Yellow-webbed Storm-Petrel. 



Procellaria oceanica, Banks. — Forst. Draw., No. 12. 



Thalassidroma oceanica, Kulil, Brit. Zool. Monog. Proc, p. 136, tab. 



10. fig. 1. 

 Oceanites wilsoni, Keys, et Bias. Wirb. Eur, torn. ii. p. 238. 



Thalassidroma wilsonii, Gould, Birds of Australia, fol., vol. vii. 

 pi. 65. 



This is also one of the most abundant species of the genus 

 inhabiting the Austrahan seas : I observed it in great numbers 

 within sight of the shores of Tasmania, and shot and preserved 

 several specimens during my passage from Sydney to Hobart 

 Town in April 1889; I also encountered it in the following 

 year in the seas between Sydney and New Zealand, while on 

 my passage towards Cape Horn. 



It is exceedingly active when flying, its wings being kept 

 fully expanded; it also makes considerable use of its feet, 

 in patting the surface of the water, with its wings extended 

 upwards and its head inclined downwards, to gather any food 

 that may present itself. Its usual diet consists of mollusca, 

 small fish, Crustacea, and any kind of greasy substance that 

 may be floating on the water. 



The sexes are so precisely similar that they can only be 

 distinguished by dissection. 



The head, neck, back, wings, and breast sooty black, the 

 wing-coverts passing into pale brown at the extremity ; pri- 



