956 ADDENDUM — SECTION D. 



15. Tringa RUFICOLLIS. 



(Eastern Stint). 



Tringa ruficollis^ Pallas, Reis. Reichs., iii., p. 700, (1776). 



Tringa albescens^ Temm., pi, col. 41, fig. 2, (1824) ; Ramsay, List 



Austr. B., p. 20, (1888). 

 Actodromas australis, Gould, Handb. B. of Austr., ii., p. 257, 



(1865). 



The correct identity of this Kttle Stint is still a matter of 

 doubt. The difference of opinion as to whether Pallas and 

 Temminck were describing the same species or not, and the 

 fact of a Stint said to be this species having bred at the 

 Houtmans Abrolhos, render it somewhat difficult to deter- 

 mine what the Australian form really is. I do not attach 

 much importance to the second difficulty, as we shall pre- 

 sently see that Arctic-breeding species, by some strange 

 impulse, occasionally stay behind to nest in the Polynesian 

 region. Some years ago I examined in the National collec- 

 tion at the British Museum and elsewhere in London, a large 

 series of Asiatic Stints, and came to the conclusion that the 

 eastern Asiatic and Australian form was referable to Tringa 

 ruficoUis of Pallas, and I may state that I was supported 

 in this view by Mr. J. E. Harting, the specialist in this 

 order of birds. Nevertheless, I am of opinion that a com- 

 parison should be made of a series of examples in breeding- 

 dress (if possible), shot on Australian coasts when on the 

 point of migration, with a series procured in summer on the 

 China coast-line before the question can be satisfactorily 

 settled. Taking our Stint to be the same as the Eastern 

 Asiatic species, its range extends from N.E, Siberia and 

 Amoorland down the coasts of China and Japan to the 

 Phihppines and the Malay Archipelago, and thence south- 

 ward to the Austrahan coasts, terminating in this Colony, in 

 which it arrives in large flocks in September and October. 

 It has been procured during the month of May in summer 

 plumage in Hainan, and at Sarawak in Borneo. At Hako- 

 dadi (North Japan) it has been obtained in partial summer 

 dress in autumn. It is found on the coasts of New Guinea 

 and on the north coast of Australia, and likewise down both 

 sides of the Continent during the Australian summer. Gould 

 records it as breeding in the Houtmans Abrolhos in December, 

 but since his time I find no evidence of its nesting on 

 Australian shores, although Mr. Campbell writes me that he 

 found it in large flocks in the same locality and on Rottnest 

 Island during December. In Tasmania I have found it 



