166 A MANUAL OF THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 



Nestling in down. Sides of head (including a broad supialoral and superciliary 

 stripe), hind-neck, and under parts white, slightly tinged with pale greyish-buffy, 

 especially on breast and sides, the whole of under parts immaculate ; a loral line 

 (from bill to eye), a postocular streak, a small spot near middle of malar region, a 

 larger spot beneath suborbital region, an obliquely transverse bar on sides of nape, 

 and a longitudinal stripe down middle of nape (the last widening posteriorly) black ; 

 median portion of crown and occiput (broadly) irregularly mottled with black and 

 cinnamon or sayal-brown ; back, rump, etc., irregularly but boldly marbled with 

 black, cinnamon and whitish, the markings more longitudinal on back, more trans- 

 verse on lower rump. (Ridgway.) 



Nest. A slight hollow in the ground lined with leaves. 



Eggs. Clutch, three ; ground-colour between cream-buff and clay colour ; 

 spotted, less numerously at the small end, with markings of irregular size, chiefly 

 of clove-brown, bistre, and even as light as wood-brown. The lighter markings 

 are for the most part rather obscure, as if imbedded in the shell, or as if laid on 

 before the ground-colour. The markings are irregularly confluent on the greater 

 hemisphere of the egg ; axis 36-37 mm. ; diameter 26.5-27.5. 



Breeding-season . June . 



Distribution and forms. Breeding in eastern Siberia and the Commander 

 Islands, westward to the Kirghiz Steppes, wintering in Australia and Africa and 

 India. Two subspecies are with difficulty separable : C. mongolus mongolus (Pallas), 

 and C. m. atrifrons Wagler, the latter the western form with a black fore-head in 

 summer and lacking the black pectoral line, while it is slightly larger in the bill 

 and tarsus. 



Genus NESOCERYX. 



Nesoceryx Mathews, Bull. Brit. Orn. Club, Vol. XLL, p. 35, Nov. 30th, 1920. Type (by 

 original designation) : Charadrius bicinctus Jardino and Selby. 



Mathews has separated the species C. bicinctus Jardine and Selby as a distinct 

 genus as we find the immature stages to differ entirely from thoee of the preceding 

 genus with which it was associated recently. The bill is quite different and the legs 

 are longer when immature specimens just losing down are compared. 



In the adult the bill is a little longer with the dertrum much less pronounced, 

 and though the wing is shorter, the tail is a little longer, while the tarsus is also a 

 little longer. Thus, gauging the adult structural features, the two were considered 

 congeneric, whereas from a study of the immature stages there is really little close 

 relationship, and the case is better considered as apparently homeomorphic. 



115. Nesoceryx bicinctus. DOUBLE BANDED DOTTEREL. 



Gould, Vol. VI., pi. 16 (pt. xrx.), June 1st, 1846. Mathews. Vol. III., pt. 1, pi. 134, April 



2nd, 1913. 



Charadrius bicinctus Jardine and Selby, Illust. Ornith., Vol. I., pi. 28, (June) 1827 : New 



Holland = New South Wales. 



Charadrius bicinctus incerlus Mathews, Nov. Zool., Vol. XVIII., p. 217, Jan. 31st, 1912: 



Point Malcolm, South-west Australia. 



DISTRIBUTION. South Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia 



and South-west Australia. 



Adult male. General colour above olive-brown, including the hinder crown, 

 hind -neck, sides of neck, entire back, scapulars, long innermost secondaries and upper 

 wing-coverts ; greater coverts margined with white at the tips ; bastard-wing and 

 primary-coverts tipped with white ; primary-quills dark brown with white shafts, 

 somewhat paler on the inner webs towards the base, basal portion of inner primaries 

 white on the outer web ; secondaries brown with pale inner webs and fringed with 



