474 AVES. 



Sub-fam. 2. Indicatorinae. Honeyguides. About 12 species, 

 Ethiopian and Indo-Malayan. They conduct travellers to bees' 

 nests, their object being to get the young bees. Indicator, Protodiscus. 

 Fam. Rhamphastidae. Toucans. Extraordinary birds with huge but 

 quite light bills, marginally serrated beak and horny, brushlike non- 

 protractile tongue. About 50 species in the tropical forests of Central 

 and South America. Rhamphastus toco L. Pteroglossus aracari 111. 

 Selenidera, Aulacorhamphus. 



Fam. Picidae. Woodpeckers. Powerfully built birds, with schizo- 

 gnathous palate, strong chisel-shaped beak pointed in front, without cere. 

 Metatarsus with transverse scales, feet with strong claws, with hard, firm 

 tail used as a prop in climbing trees. The tongue is long, flat, and horny, 

 and bears at its end short recurved hooks ; it can be rapidly protruded to 

 a considerable distance in consequence of a peculiar mechanism of the 

 hyoid bone. The cornua of the hyoid are bent into wide arches and in 

 some extend over the skull to the base of the beak. There are about 350 

 species found in all temperate and tropical lands except Madagascar, 

 Australia, and Polynesia. 



Sub-fam. 1. Picinae. Woodpeckers. For the most part solitary 

 woodland birds of a shy and retiring nature, with powerful chisel-like 

 beak and very extensile tongue. They bore holes in trees, in which they 

 lay their eggs. Picus martins L., black woodpecker, Europe and Asia, 

 not in Britain. Dendrocopus major L., the greater spotted, and 

 Dendrocopus minor, the lesser spotted woodpecker, both British, 

 also in Europe and N. Asia. Gecinus viridis, the green woodpecker, 

 British, also in Europe and N. Asia. There are about 50 genera, of 

 which we may mention, Melanerpes, Picoides (with 3 toes only), 

 Meiglyptes, Tigan, Picumnus, Sasia. 



Sub-fam. 2. lynginae. Wrynecks, with one genus lynx L., 

 Europe, Asia, Africa, with soft tail and naked nostril and extensile 

 tongue. They feed chiefly on the ground and utilise ready-made 

 cavities for their eggs. /. torquilla L., wryneck, British. 



Tribe 14. PASSERIFORMES. 



The passerine birds are quintocubital ; the palate is aegithognathous, 

 without basipterygoid process, generally with large backwardly directed 

 processes of the palatines ; hallux invariably large and backwardly directed ; 

 front of shank covered with a small number of large scales ; left carotid 

 only present. The caeca are small, and the young are altrices. The num- 

 ber of species is enormous, about 5,500 or more than half the total 

 number of living birds, but the variation in structure is very small, and 

 the families have not the value even of those of the other tribes of birds. 

 The families are grouped according to the arrangement of the muscles of 

 the syrinx. 



Group 1. Passeres Anisomyodae (Clamatores). 



The syrinx muscles are either entirely lateral, or only dorsal or only 

 ventral. 



Fam. Eurylaemidae. Broad-bills, Indo-Malaya ; 10 species. Eurylae- 

 mus, Psarisomus, Calyptomena. 



Fam. Pittidae. Tropics of the Old World, about 50 species. Pitta, 

 Afr., Ind., Aust. Philepitta, Madagascar. 



