62 THE GAME BIEDS AND WILD FOWL 



Family PHASIANID.E. Genus COTURNIX. 



QUAIL. 



COTUKNIX COMMUNIS. Bonnaterre. 



Tetrao coturnix, Linn. Syst. Nat. i. p. 278 (1766). 



Coturnix dactylisonans, Meyer ; Macgill. Brit. B. i. p. 233 (1837). 



Coturnix communis, Bonnat. ; Dresser, B. Eur. vii. p. 143, pi. 476 (1878) ; Yarrell 

 Brit. B. cd. 4 iii. p. 123 (1883); Seebohm, Hist. Brit. B. ii. p. 462 (1884); Dixon, 

 Nests and Eggs Brit. B.p. 352 (1893); Lilford, Col. Pig. Brit. B. pt. xxviii. (1893) 

 Seebohm, Col. Fig. Eggs Brit. B. p. 277, pi. 59 (1896). 



Coturnix coturnix (Linn.), Grant, Cat. B. Brit. Mus. xxii. p. 231 (1893); Sharpe, 

 Handb. B. Gt. Brit. iv. p. 287 (1897). 



Geographical distribution British: The Quail is a summer visitor 

 to most parts of the British Islands, extending to the Outer Hebrides, the Orkneys, 

 and Shetlands, but appears to be nowhere common. A few winter in the south of 

 England and in Ireland : in the latter country the bird is said to be slowly becoming 

 extinct. Foreign: Palsearctic region, from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The Quail 

 is a summer visitor to Europe south of lat. 64. It occurs throughout North 

 Africa, Palestine, and Asia Minor, but in the basin of the Mediterranean is 

 chiefly known on passage, although a few remain to breed and a few remain to 

 winter in that district, whilst in the Azores and the Canaries it is a resident. 

 The majority of the West Palsearctic birds winter in the African portion of the 

 Intertropical realm. Eastwards the Quail visits Persia, Afghanistan, Turkestan 

 (where a few remain to winter), Siberia, and the north island of Japan in summer, 

 wintering in Arabia, throughout India, Burma, and China, south to the Tropic of 

 Cancer. It has also been recorded from Mayotte and the Grand Comoro Islands 

 in the Indian Ocean. 



Allied forms. The Common Quail is another species presenting con- 

 siderable variation, but whether these differences are sufficiently constant 

 geographically to warrant specific or even subspecific distinction is by no means 

 clear. Beginning in the West Palsearctic region, Mr. Meade Waldo states (Ibis, 

 1889, p. 517) that in the Canary Islands there are two races of Quail, one coming 

 to the islands to breed, the other wintering there. This latter, he says, is smaller, 

 darker, and more brightly coloured than the migrants, with brilliant yellow legs, 

 those of the former being flesh-coloured. The Quails of SouthAfrica have been 

 described as distinct under the name of Coturnix capensis, being somewhat 

 smaller in size, and having the sides of the head, the chin, and the throat, bright 



