24 CORVID &. 
being a much browner bird in general coloration, more especially 
so on the neck and shoulders. The neck-hackles are even shorter 
than in daurencet and it is rather smaller also than either of the 
previous forms. 
Measurements. Wing about 400 mm. and ranging between 
380 and 420mm. The bill in the Indian form is also more 
slender than it is in either the Tibet or Punjab Raven. 
Distribution. Sind, Baluchistan, S. Persia, Palestine and 
N. Africa to Abyssinia. 
AYN d= 
WN 
SSS 
Fig. 3.—A throat-hackle of C.c. ruficollis. 
Nidification. The Brown-necked Raven builds in cliffs or river 
banks throughout its whole area. In Baluchistan it apparently 
occasionally breeds in the rocky sides of the steeper and more 
broken gorges and cliffs. In South Palestine it breeds in great 
numbers in the river banks or in the many precipitous ravines 
in that country and the little that is on record concerning its 
breeding elsewhere agrees with this. It usually lays four eggs, 
often three only and sometimes five. Col. R. Meinertzhagen 
took a fine series of the eggs near Jerusalem. They are very 
small and can hardly be distinguished from those of a Carrion- 
Crow but they are rather poorly marked on the whole, less brown 
than those of the Tibet Raven but much less richly coloured than 
those of the Punjab Raven. They measure about 45:0 x 315mm. 
The breeding season in Palestine seems to commence in early 
March, but in Baluchistan they lay in December and January. 
Habits. This is essentially a bird of the desert or of rocky 
barren coasts and hills and wherever such are intersected by cul- 
tivated or better forested areas the Punjab Raven or some other 
form takes its place. It is a more companionable bird than either 
of its Indian relations and where it is most numerous several pairs 
may be seen consorting together. 
Meinertzhagen, who has recently examined a mass of material, 
is unable to detect any characters by which wmbrinus of India 
to Palestine can be separated from ruficollis of Africa. 
— (4) Corvus corone orientalis. 
Tur Eastern Carrion-Crow. 
Corvus orientalis Fversm., Add. Pall. Zoogyr., ii, p. 7 (1841) 
(Buchtarma), 
Corvus corone. Blanf. & Oates, i, p. 16. 
