PLEGADIS. 157 
Order ARDEIFORMES. 
HERONS, STORKS, IBISES, AND SPOONBILLS. 
Body usually compressed ; neck and legs very long; plumage full and 
soft; bill long, normally straight, wedge-shaped, and pointed, but in 
Ibidide blunt and decurved, in Plataleide broadly spatulate ; nostrils near 
base of bill, elongate; hind toe insistent or but slightly elevated. Nest 
made of sticks and twigs usually placed in a tree or bush; eggs three to 
five, blue and unspotted ; young helpless at birth. 
Suborders. 
a1, Sides of upper mandible with a deep, narrow groove extending from nostrils 
[iY 0 noe bob See Ree Re li oe Platalee (p. 157) 
a, Sides of upper mandible without any groove. 
bt. Claws broad and flat, that of middle toe not pectinate.......... Ciconie (p. 159) 
b?, Claws narrow and arched, that of middle toe with its inner edge distinctly 
AC CUNM ENG orca ee oe ere se eea eae aera nena ce fo a ace nhc Sdvnant nn aceea een Ardez (p. 161) 
Suborder PLATALE#. 
Families. 
a. Bill slender, nearly cylindrical, decidedly decurved for nearly its whole length. 
: Ibidide (p. 157) 
a. Bill very broad, flattened, greatly widened toward the tip.. Plataleide (p. 158) 
Family IBIDIDA. 
Bill long, compressed, and curved downward, its tip blunt and 
rounded ; on each side of culmen a longitudinal groove in the basal portion 
of which the nostril is pierced. 
Genus PLEGADIS Kaup, 1829. 
Characters same as those given for the Family. 
131. PLEGADIS AUTUMNALIS (Linneus). 
GLOSSY IBIS, 
Tringa autumnalis LINNZUS in Hasselquist, Reise Palestina (1762), 306. 
Plegadis falcinellus Oates, Bds. Brit. Burmah (1883), 2, 271; SHARPE, 
Cat. Birds Brit. Mus. (1898), 26, 29; Hand-List (1899), 1, 187; 
Oates, Cat. Birds’ Eggs (1902), 2, 102; Mearns, Proc. Biol. Soc. 
Wash. (1905), 18, 89; McGrecor and Worcester, Hand-List (1906), 
oils 
Mindanao (Mearns). China, Africa, Jamaica, Australia, eastern United States, 
southern Europe to India. 
