ARDEID^ ARDEOLA 75 



Grey and Purple Herons and Snake-birds. The nests were slight 

 structures built of sticks, and each contained from three to five 

 eggs. They occupied the middle portion of the tree, the larger 

 Herons being at the top and the Snake-birds among the thicker 

 branches below. A single egg sent to the South African Museum 

 by 'Mr. Fry is of the usual pale greenish-blue colour and almost 

 a regular oval iu shape. It measures 1/8 X 1*3. 



Genus V. ARDEOLA. 



Type. 

 Ardeola, Boie, Isis, 1822, p. 559 A. ralloides. 



Bill long and slender, culmen about equal to the middle toe and 

 claw in length ; the upper mandible with a groove on either side, at 

 the base of which is the nostril ; the mandibles serrated at their 

 tips ; wings rather short and rounded ; tail of twelve feathers, 

 short and nearly square ; only the lower fourth of the tibio-tarsus 

 bare, this portion less than the inner toe and claw ; tarsus short, 

 less than the bill and less than the middle toe and claw ; feathers 

 of the head and neck elongate in the breeding plumage, those of the 

 fore-neck and back decomposed as well ; plumage chiefly white and 

 buff. 



Some four or five species of this genus are usually recognised ; 

 they are distributed over the temperate and tropical portions of 

 Europe, Africa and Asia, extending as far as the Moluccas, and 

 including Madagascar. Only one species is found in South Africa. 



595. Ardeola ralloides. Squacco Heron. 



Ardea ralloides, Scop. Ann. i, p. 88 (1769) ; Dresser, B. Ear. vi, p. 251, 



pi. 400, fig. 2 (1879). 

 Ardea coinata, Pall. Beis. Buss. Beichs, ii, p. 715 (1773) ; Layard. 



B. S. Afr. p. 308 (1867) ; Ayres, Ibis, 1873, p. 283 ; Holub <& Pelzeln, 



Orn. Siid- Afr. p. 274 (1882). 

 Buphus comatus, Gurney, Ibis, 1860, p. 221, 1862, p. 157 ; Kirk, Ibis, 



1864, p. 333. 

 Ardeola comata, Gurney, in Andersson's B. Damaral. p. 288 (1872) 



Buckley, Ibis, 1874, p. 390 ; Ayres, Ibis, 1877, p. 349, 1878, p. 300, 



1880, p. Ill ; Sharpe, ed. Layards B. S. Afr. p. 718 (1884). 

 Ardea leucoptera (nee Bodd.) Barratt, Ibis, 1876, p. 210. 

 Herodias ralloides, Shelley, B. Afr. i, p. 156 (1896) ; Alexander, Ibis, 



1900, p. 439. 

 Ardeola ralloides, Fleck, Journ. OrnitJi. 1894, p. 388; Sharpe, Cat. 



B. M. xxvi, pp. 202, 281 (1898) ; Beiclienow, Vog. Afr. i, p. 374 (1901) 



