CUCULID^ CHKYSOCOCCYX 187 



Chrysococcyx klaaei, Gurney, Ibis, 1859, p. 247 [Natal]; Gurncy in 

 Andersson's B. Damaraland, p. 229 (1872) ; Shelley, Cat. B. M 

 xix, p. 283 (1891) ; id. B. Afr. i, p. 124 (1896) ; Sharpe, Ibis, 1897, 

 p. 499 [Zululand] ; Woodward Bros. Natal B. p. 118 (1899) ; Ivy, 

 Ibis, 1901, p. 28 [Albany]. 



Chalcites klaasi, Layard, B. S. Afr. p. 250 (1867). 



" Meitje " of the Colonists. 



Description. Adult male. Above, bright metallic-green with 

 coppery-red reflections ; a white patch of feathers above and behind 

 the eye ; wing-quills dusky with a white barring on the inner web ; 

 four central tail-feathers like the back, six outer feathers white with 

 a subterminal green bar and a series of narrower bars of the same 

 colour chiefly on their inner webs ; below, white, the green of the 

 upper surface continued round to form a patch on either side of the 

 breast ; sides of the body and under wing-coverts barred with black ; 

 the long front thigh-coverts metallic-green. 



Iris brown, edge of eyelid pea-green ; bill greenish-brown tipped 

 with black ; legs and feet dusky greenish-brown. 



Length 7-0; wing 4-10; tail 3-0 ; culmen 0-55 ; tarsus 0-60. 



The female has the head and nape dusky-brown, an indistinct 

 spot over the ear-coverts barred dull white and brown ; back, mantle 

 and wings metallic-green barred with pale rufous. Wing-quills 

 dusky spotted with rufous on both webs ; the tail as in the male 

 but dusky bronze rather than green ; beneath buffy-white, nar- 

 rowly barred with dark-brown lines, the brown of the sides of the 

 head advancing to form a patch on either side of the neck ; thigh- 

 coverts barred green and rufous. 



Length 6-75 ; wing 4-0 ; tail 3'0. 



The young male resembles the female, but has the crown barred 

 with green and rufous like the back, the under-parts are white 

 barred with brownish-bronze. 



Distribution. This Cuckoo has much the same range as the 

 Emerald, extending from the Gambia, upper Nile districts and 

 Abyssinia southwards to Cape Colony. In South Africa it is found 

 only between November and March, and it no doubt retreats north- 

 wards during the winter to the warmer and more northerly portions 

 of Africa, as it has been obtained in Abyssinia from May to August, 

 in Niam Niam in March, and at Mombasa and Lamu in July and 

 August. But that not all the birds migrate to South Africa is 

 proved by the fact that it has been recorded from Kilimanjaro in 

 January and the Cameroons in February. 



In South Africa Klaas' Cuckoo has a somewhat more extended 



