australian limicol^. 945 



5. Terekia cinerea. 



(Avocet Sandpiper). 



Scolopax cinerea, Giild., N. Comm. Acad. Sci. Imp. Petrop., xix., 



p. 473, (1774). 

 Tringa cinerea, Ramsay, List Austr. B., p. 20, (1888). 



This curious Sandpijjer breeds iu Northern Asia and 

 Europe as also on the River Terek (Caspian Sea), and is a 

 cohl weather visitant from North Asia to India, Malayana, 

 and the northern parts of AustraHa. Mr. Seebolini found it 

 abundant in tlie Ijreeding season on the Yenesay, as far north 

 as kit. 70°. Dr. Finsch procured it in Kara Bay in July ; 

 Schrenk obtained it on the Amoor, and Von Middendorf 

 on the coasts of the Sea of Okhotsk ; it doubtless, therefore, 

 breeds throughout all the western portion of Siberia. From 

 this region it passes in the winter season southward to 

 Northern India, where it is abundant, and wanders thence 

 through Tennasserim, Ceylon, the Andaman Islands, and 

 Malay Peninsida to Java, Sumatra, and Borneo, but I do 

 not find it recorded from either the Philippines or Celebes. 

 It likewise passes down the coasts of China to the Malay 

 Archipelago, and thence onward to Australia. Dr. Ramsay 

 records it from the Wide Bay District, and Gould obtained 

 his example on the River Mokai, New South Wales, in 

 July, its breeding season. It follows, therefore, that this 

 bird must have been a barren or non -migratory individual. 

 Messrs. Sharj^e and Dresser, in their " Birds of Europe," 

 record its occurrence in Tasmania, but no recent testimony of 

 its visiting the shores of this colony is obtainable. 



In Eastern Europe it has been met with in large numbers 

 on the islands near Archangel and on the Petchora, but it 

 does not appear to range to the western part of the continent, 

 not having been found in Great Britain or in Spain, although 

 it has occurred in France, and on passage to the south it has 

 been obtained in Italy. It passes through Western Asia to 

 the Persian Gulf and Arabia, and strays rarely down the 

 East coast of Africa to Natal and Madagascar, notwithstanding 

 that it appears to avoid Egypt. 



The peculiarity of this bird's migratory habit is that it 

 avoids the western shores of the continents of Europe and 

 Africa, and seems to centre itself in Northern India in the 

 winter, being comparatively infrequent to the east and 

 west of that region, wandering nevertheless in small numbers 

 very far south. It is one of our rarest Australian visitants, 



