40 BRITISH BIRDS. 



CHARADRIUS FULVUS. 

 ASIATIC GOLDEN PLOVER. 



(PLATE 25.) 



Charadrius fulvus, Gmel. Syst. Nut. i. p. 687 (1788) ; et auctorum plurimorum 



Swinhoe, Hume, Salvadori, Dresser, Oates, &c. 

 Charadrius xanthocheilus, Wagl. Syst. Ac. sp. 36 (1827). 

 Charadrius taitensis, Less. Man. d'Orn. ii. p. 321 (1828). 



Charadrius glaucopus, Licht. Forster's Descr. Anim. It. Mar. Austr. p. 176 (1844). 

 Charadrius pluvialis orientalis, Temm. et Schlegel, Faun. Japan, p. 104 (1847). 

 Pluvialis longipes, Temm. fide ~} 



Pluvialis xanthocheilus (Waal.), I 



-DT . ,. , ., , T ^ >Bonap. Rev. Crit. 1856. p. 417. 



Pluviahs taitensis (Less.), 



Pluvialis fulvus (Gmel.), 



Charadrius dominicus fulvus, Ridgway, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus. iii. p. 198 (1880). 



The Asiatic Golden Plover was first discovered by Dr. Forster, who 

 found it on the shores in marshy places on Otaheite, one of the Society 

 Islands. This celebrated traveller accompanied Captain Cook on several 

 of his voyages, and collected a valuable series of drawings of birds, which 

 are now deposited in the British Museum. The claim of this species to a 

 place in the British list rests upon a single example, which was procured in 

 1874. It was noticed by Mr. Bidwell, in December of that year, in 

 Leadenhall Market, whence it had been sent from Norfolk with a number 

 of Golden Plovers. Mr. Bidwell communicated his discovery to Mr. 

 Dresser, who identified the species, and in whose collection the example 

 now is (Dresser, Ibis, 1875, p. 513). 



The Asiatic Golden Plover breeds* on the tundras of Eastern Siberia, 

 from the valley of the Yenesay to the Pacific. It passes through Japan, 

 South Siberia, and Mongolia on migration, and winters in India, the 



* Swinhoe's statement that the Eastern Golden Plover breeds on the island of Formosa 

 (Ibis, 1863, p. 404) is unquestionably an error. The eggs which he obtained are now in 

 my collection, and do not differ from eggs of Rhynchcea benyalensis, and are not half the 

 size of the true eggs of the Eastern Golden Plover, which I obtained more than three 

 thousand miles further to the north. Layard's statement (Ibis, 1879, p. 107) that the 

 Eastern Golden Plover breeds on New Caledonia cannot be regarded as evidence, as the 

 bird was only seen and not obtained: and though the statement is reiterated (Ibis, 1881, 

 p. 135), the almost unanimous verdict of ornithologists is that the alleged fact is possible 

 but not probable. It is a great pity that Oates (Birds of Brit. Burrnah, ii. p. 365) should 

 have propagated Swinhoe's error, which I corrected (Ibis, 1879, p. 154), and which was 

 quoted and confirmed by Legge (Birds of Ceylon, p. 936). These errors have probably 

 arisen from the fact that immature birds, which have not yet begun to breed, of this and 

 other allied species, occasionally remain in their winter-quarters throughout their first 

 summer. 



