STORKS. 



167 



molluscs, they have also been called ' shell-ibises.' Jerdon tells how he saw a blinded 

 open-bill extracting the whole animal of an Ampidlaria without breaking the shell, 

 the bird first securing it by its feet and cutting off the operculum. Two species com- 

 pose the genus Anastomus, one from India and Indo-China, the other from the Ethio- 

 pian region. The latter, which is the species figured, differs chiefly in having the 



FIG. 83. Sphenorhynchus abdimii, white-bellied stork. 



feathers of the neck and lower parts ending in a horny lamella, hence the specific 

 name, A. lamdligerus. The general color is blackish, shining green, and purple. 



The American jabiru (Mycteria americana) differs from its Indian and Australian 

 relatives in having the whole head and neck naked, and black, with a flesh-colored 

 ring round the lower end of the neck. In having the end of the bill slightly turned 

 up, the saddle-billed stork (Epkippiorhynchus senegalensis) agrees with the jabirus, 

 but it has a peculiar, soft membranaceous shield on top at base of the bill, therein 

 agreeing with the following species (Sphenorhynchus abdimii), of which a figure is 



