PLOCEID^I PLOCEIPASSER 85 



ing season one entrance is stopped up with leaves and grass, a 

 shallow cavity being left in which the female deposits two or three 

 eggs, about the first week in December on the Limpopo River. As 

 soon as the young are on the wing the second entrance is unstopped, 

 and the nest is again used, both by the old and young birds, as 

 a roosting-place. These nests are annually repaired and last for 

 many years. The eggs are white suffused with pink, thickly 

 marked, especially at the broad end, with blotches and streaks of 

 deep brown-pink. They average 1-00 x 0'72. 



42. Ploceipasser rufoscapulatus. Bed-backed Weaver Bird. 



Ploceipasser rufoscapulatus,- BiittiJc. Notes Leyd. Mus. x. p. 238, 

 pi. 9, fig. 2 (1888) ; Sharpe, Cat. B. M. xiii, p. 248 (1890) ; Shelley, 

 B. Afr. i, p. 34 (1896). 



Description. Adult male. Above, back, scapulars and lesser 

 wing-coverts reddish-brown, fading into ash-brown on the lower 

 back, rump and upper tail-coverts ; middle and greater coverts 

 black tipped with white ; quills blackish edged with rufous and 

 dull white ; tail light brown ; forehead and sides of crown black ; 

 centre of crown and nape ash-grey; eye-brow, ear-coverts and 

 cheeks grey ; lores, feathers round eye, upper ear-coverts and 

 malar streak black ; throat white ; lower throat and breast greyish- 

 brown ; rest of under surface pale grey ; under wing-coverts ash- 

 colour mottled with brown. 



Iris dark brown ; bill, tarsi and feet horn-brown. 



Length 6-20 ; wing 3-80 ; tail 2-30 ; tarsus O80 ; culmen O75. 



Distribution. Ovampo Land, the Cunene River valley and 

 Benguela. 



, 



43. Ploceipasser pectoralis. Stripe-chested Weaver Bird. 



Ploceipasser pectoralis, Peters, Journ. f. Orn. 1868, p. 133 ; Sharpe, 

 Cat. B. M. xiii, p. 247 (1890) ; Shelley, B. Afr. i, p. 34 (1896). 



Description. Adult. Like P. mahali, but the mantle is more 

 rufous ; the feathers of the crop are streaked with large dark brown 

 lanceolate centres, and the bill is black. 



Young. Back and edges of the secondaries more rufous than in 

 the adult. 



Distribution. The Zambesi Delta and Nyasaland, ranging 

 southward in Portuguese East Africa to Inhambane (Peters). 



Habits. Like those of P. mahali. 



