246 ARDEIDJE. 



but not fine, and has no gloss whatsoever ; in colour it is a uniform 

 delicate sea-green, very much like that of A. grayi. 



In length the eggs vary from 1-72 to 2'01 and in breadth from 

 1-28 to 1-41. 



Demiegretta sacra (Grin.). The Eastern Reef-Heron. 

 Ardea sacra, Gm., Hume, Rough Draft N. fy E. no. 928 bis. 



Within our limits we only as yet know of this Reef-Heron's 

 breeding in the Andamaus and Nicobars, the Tenasserim and 

 Arracan coasts. 



In the Andamans it lays from the middle of April to the middle 

 of June, a little earlier or later according to the time the monsoon 

 sets in. 



Mr. Davison remarks : " At the Andamans, at least in Port 

 Blair and its immediate vicinity, it is not nearly so abundant as it 

 is at the Nicobars. At the Andamans it breeds on a small islet of 

 Corbyn's Cove, South Andaman. This islet is low and rocky, and 

 is partially covered at high tide. About the centre it rises into a 

 rugged crag, about fifteen or twenty feet high, full of crevices. 

 It is partially covered with coarse grass, and out of one side grows 

 a stunted ragged tree. In the crevices and in some of the larger 

 branches of the tree these birds build their nests, which are simply 

 platforms of sticks with only a slight depression for the eggs. In 

 the early part of May there were six nests on the island, but 1 

 only obtained one egg ; the birds had not laid in the others, though 

 they had apparently ceased building. The vicinity of these nests 

 had a very disagreeable fishy smell. All the Herons I saw on this 

 island were the dark ashy ones, and one that was caught on her 

 nest was also of the dark variety. At Trinkut Island the natives 

 told me that they built their nests on the cocoanut palms." 



Capt. E.E. Shopland writes that on the 19th May he had occasion 

 to visit Oyster Island, off the Arrakan coast, and that he found eight 

 or nine nests of this Reef- Heron in a patch of thorny jungle near 

 the centre of the island. The nests were from one to three feet 

 from the ground, and were composed of dead sticks and leaf-stalks. 

 No nest contained more than three eggs. The colour of the eggs 

 was light green, and they measured on the average T76 by 1*28 

 inch." 



To judge from those taken by Mr. Davison and others sent me 

 by Captain Wimberley, which were taken somewhat later in the 

 year, the eggs are of the ordinary Heron type, moderately elon- 

 gated ovals in shape, the shell rather coarse, much pitted with 

 minute pores, and entirely glossless. The colour is a uniform 

 very pale sea-green. They have of course no markings or spots of 

 any kind, though as incubation proceeds they get more or less 

 stained and tinged with brownish soils. They vary from 1*59 to 

 1-85 in length, arid from 1/25 to 1'33 in breadth. The average of 

 seven eggs is 1-7 by 1-3. 



