1920.] Birds of the Canary Islands. 511 



inliabiting one or more islands, but never, of course, more 

 tliau one form in an island. We find Farus cceru/eus teneriffoi 

 in Gran Canaria, Tenerife, and Gomera, P. c. ombriosus in 

 Hierro, P. c. palmensis in Palma, P. c. degener in Fuerte- 

 ventura and Lanzarote. 



The above mentioned are the only Canarian species with 

 representative races in all tlie large islands. 



Of the rest of the Resident Avifauna the most interesting 

 from the point of view of distribution are the Chaffinches, 

 of which there are five representatives in the western islands 

 and none in the eastern islands. The remarkable Blue 

 Chaffinch, confined to the pine forests of Tenerife, FringUla 

 teydea teydea, and its subspecies (F. t. polatzeki) confined to 

 the pine forests of Gran Canaria, are perhaps the most 

 ancient types of bird-life to be found in the Archipelago, 

 for they have no closely allied form anywhere in the world. 



The -other three Canarian Chaffinches are by some ornitho- 

 logists concluded to be geographical races of our European 

 bird FringUla coelebs, i. e. Fringilla ccdehs canariensis, which 

 inhabits Gran Canaria, Tenerife, and Gomei'a, F. c. pahnce, 

 tv^hich is confined to Palma, and F. c. oiabriusa to Hierro. 

 They are such distinct forms that many consider them 

 "good species," and although I have treated them as 

 subspecies in this paper, 1 feel that I am perhaps in error 

 in having done so. 



It will be noticeable that this is the same insular distri- 

 bution as we found amongst the Titmice. The same 

 Chaffinch and the same Titmouse inhabit Gran Canaria, 

 Tenerife, and Gomera, while two difi'erent Chaffinches 

 and two different Titmice frequent Palma and Hierro 

 respectively. The only dift'erence is that whereas the 

 Titmice have a representative race in the eastern group 

 the Chaffinches are confined to the western islands. 



There are other curious instances of distribution where 

 two distinct races are found in the western group alone. 

 For instance, Tenerife and Gran Canaria, each has its own 

 Great Spotted Woodpecker, Dryobutes major canariensis and 

 D. m. ihanneri respectively. 



