248 THE BIRDS OF HELIGOLAND 



73. Dusky Thrush [BRAUNE DKOSSEL]. 

 TUKDUS FUSCATUS, Pallas. 



Turdus fuscatus. Naumann, xiii. 307. 



Dusky Thrush. Dresser, ii. 63. 



Turdus fuscatus. Pallas, Zoog. Ross.-Asiat. i. 451. 



Of this Siberian Thrush, too, so rarely met with in Europe, my 

 collection possesses a beautiful specimen, a young autumn bird in 

 fresh uninjured plumage. It was caught here in the throstle-bush 

 on the 10th of October 1880. Apart from this example, the fol- 

 lowing are fully-corroborated records of its occurrence in Europe : 

 Bechstein, 1795 ; Naurnann, 1804 ; Giglioli, Turin, 1829 ; Brescia, 

 1844 ; Genoa, 1862 ; Florence, 1879. 



Further, Baron de Selys Longchamps, is said to possess a Thrush 

 caught in Belgium, which was originally regarded as T. naumanni, 

 but subsequently proved to be T. fuscatus. 



It is, however, quite possible that a similar confounding of 

 species may have occurred in regard to the Italian examples, one 

 or other examples designated as T. fuscatus belonging really to 

 T. naumanni ; for it is very surprising that this latter species also 

 has not been met with among other Siberian Thrushes so numer- 

 ously represented in Italy, especially as in the rest of Europe it has 

 occurred in vastly larger numbers than T. fuscatus. Equally strange 

 is it to find, in Giglioli's Fauna Italica, how sparingly Siberian 

 Leaf- Warblers and Buntings are represented in Italy, as compared 

 with its richness in Siberian Thrushes. 



The example caught here has all its upper parts of a dusky 

 brown, somewhat similar to the colour of the back of the Fieldfare 

 a dull dusky ferruginous (rostroth) colour shining through on the 

 covered portions of the feathers. On the rump this rust colour 

 becomes very distinct, but on the upper tail-coverts it is again 

 hidden by dusky edges. 



The flight- and tail-feathers are blackish, edged with the colour 

 of the back. In the tail-feathers, the edges towards the roots pass 

 into a dusky rust colour ; the great wing-coverts as well as the 

 secondaries have dull, rust-coloured, well-defined edges, and the 

 former, like the posterior flight-feathers, have whitish tips. The 

 inner wing-coverts and the inner webs of the flight-feathers are 

 whitish ferruginous (weisslich-rostrotfi). 



A very broad, dull yellowish white eye-streak runs from the 

 nostril to and beyond the ear-coverts ; the sides of the neck and 



