Distribution of the True Pheasants. 385 



/3'. G eneral colour very dark ; mantle 

 and flanks intense golden 

 orange; scapular margins dark 

 maroon or chocolate-rufous ; 

 crown more rusty brown ; 

 superciliaries narrower aud 

 partly chestnut-stained ; front 

 and sides of neck more purplish 

 blue ; wing-coverts sandy or 

 creamy grey ; rump not much 

 mottled 22. karpowi (p. 405). 



[N.B. — In describing the colours, I hold the birds between myself and 

 the light, the head being towards the light.] 



1. Phasianus colchicus Linn. (Rion Pheasant.} 



Ph. colchicus : 1758, Linn. Syst. Nat. p. 158 (" rufus, capite 

 caeruleo. Habitat in Africa, A sia ") ; 1893, Ogilvie-Grant, 

 Cat. Gall. p. 320 (pt., cum subsp. septentr.) ; 1897, Wil- 

 konsky, Ornith. Faun, of Adsharia, Gooria, and N.E. Lasistan 

 (liuss.), p. 65; 1903, Dresser, Manual, p. 658 (pt., cum 

 subsp. septentr.). 



The typical Ph. colchicus inhabits the western part of 

 Transcaucasia : the basins of the Rion and Chorokh and the 

 south-eastern and eastern coasts of Black Sea, not further 

 north than Sukhum-kale. It is completely separated from 

 all the allied forms by mountain -chains. 



2. Phasianus colchicus septentrionalis Lorenz. (Cau- 

 casian Pheasant.) 



Ph. colchicus: 1811, Pallas, Zoogr. ii. p. 83; 1887, Th. 

 Lorenz, Beitr. Ornith. Nordseite Kaukas. p. 56 ; 1893, 

 Ogilvie-Grant, Cat. Gall. p. 320 (pt., cum colchica ave) ; 

 1903, Dresser, Manual, p. 658 (pt., cum colch.). 



Ph. colchicus L., subsp. septentrionalis : 1888, Th. Lorenz, 

 J. f. O. p. 571 (Kuban, Terek). 



This well-marked form inhabits the basins of the Kuban, 

 Terek, and Kuma up to some 2000-2500 feet, and the 

 western coast of the Caspian from the mouths of the Volga 

 nearly to the Apsheron Peninsula. In the central parts of 

 its range, from Stavropol to Georgievsk, it was exterminated 

 in the last half of the nineteenth century. 



