Orus communis. 59 



GRUS COMMUNIS. Bechst. 

 THE COMMON CRANE. 

 Aedba aRus, Linn. Syst. Nat., vol. i., p. 234. (1766.) 

 Geos communis, Bechst. Vog. Deutsch, vol. iii., p. 60. (1793.) 

 Grus cinerea (Bechst.) Meyer, Tasch. deut. Vog., vol. ii., p. 350. (1810.) 

 Gkds vulgaris, Pall. Zoogr. Rosso-As., vol. ii., p. 106. (1811-31.) 

 Geus cinerea longieostris, Temm. & Schl. Fauna Jap., p. 117. (1850.) 

 Geus cinbeacea, Brehm, Naumannia, p. 289. (1855.) 

 Grus cinerea, Gould, Birds of Europe, vol. iv., pi. 270. 

 Geus cinerea, Gould, Birds of Great Brit., vol. iv., pi. 19, 

 Geus communis, Dresser, Birds of Europe, part 18 (adult and young) 



The Common Crane of Europe and Asia generally, which also visits 

 North-East Africa in winter, its former range of distribution extending 

 from Ireland to Japan. There appears to me, however, to be an oriental 

 race and an occidental race, which have not hitherto been discriminated. 

 The western form has black tertiaries, and the naked skin of the crown is 

 much more developed in the breeding season than it ever is in the race which 

 is a common winter visitant in India ; and in the latter or oriental race the 

 tertiaries are about concolorous with the rest of the plumage, having merely 

 black tips. During the whole period of my stay in India, my late friend 

 Babu Rajendra Mallika kept some twenty or thirty of the northern Saras 

 Crane {G. collaris), a dozen or more of the common species {G. communis, 

 var. orientalis) , and some two or three dozen of the Demoiselle Crane 

 [G. virgo), and I was in the constant habit of observing them at all seasons ; 

 but never did I see in the Indian bird any approach to the fine crimson poll 

 which I have subsequently remarked on several European examples of G. 

 communis, there being only a narrow band of red skin crossing the vertex. 

 The general plumage, too, of the oriental bird is decidedly browner, and 

 permanently so at all ages and seasons. The two bred together some four 

 or five years ago in the Regent's Park Gardens, and the figure given in 

 Dresser's " Birds of Europe " is uncommonly like the mixed offspring of the 

 two, only not brown enough, the eastern form being never nearly so grey. 

 The western form should have the crimson much more developed on the 

 vertex and occiput, and the tertiaries should be contrastingly much blacker. 

 Both have the neck dull white, with forehead and occipital mark ashy black, 

 as are also the throat and whole front of the neck, leaving only the sides and 

 lower part of the neck behind of a somewhat subdued white. Buflbn's or 

 Daubenton's figure in the " Planches Enluminees " (pi. 769) is somewhat 

 more true to life, but represents an adolescent bird. The late Mr. G. R. 



