844 

 NOTES ON BIRDS FROM NORTHERN AND WESTERN PERSIA 



BY 



P. A. Buxton, m.a., m.b.o.tt.. 



Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. 



{With a Map.) 



The following notes are based on several small collections made by Officers on 

 active service in N. W. Persia in 1918 and 1919. The Society has lent rre skins 

 from the Cox-Cheesman collection, collected by Major R. E. Cheesman, t.a.r.o., 

 while travelling from Baghdad to Tehran, and from Tehran to Enzeli in May and 

 June 1919, and a few very interesting skins collected by Capt. C. M. Ingoldby, 

 B.A.M.C., at Zinjan in Khamse and at Bandar-i-Gaz in Asterabad Bay. I am 

 extremely obliged to the Society for the loan of these specimens, and to Major 

 Cheesman for a copy of his very full notes. The majority of the specimens 

 which I examined were collected by myself in 1918 and 1919. Cheesman's and 

 Ingoldby's specimens and notes have been distinguished by the initials " R. E. 

 C." and " C. M. I." ; records and skins not so distinguished may be presumed 

 to be my own. Any record to which no date is given refers to the year 1919. 



It is a pleasure also to acknowledge my deep debt to Lord Rothschild and 

 Dr. Hartert at Tring, to the authorities in the Bird Room of the British Museum, 

 and to Mr. H. F. Witherby and Dr. C. B. Ticehurst. I feel that I may congrat- 

 ulate myself that it has not been found necessary to describe a single new 

 sub-species. The value of the sub-species as a record of geographical or envi- 

 ronmental variation, and as a means of calling attention to what appear to be 

 species in the making, is a thing which few modern zoologists would dispute. 

 The description of sub-species from Persia, however, has done more than keep 

 pace with our knowledge of the avifauna, and it is to be regretted that the great- 

 est investigator of the birds of Persia, the late N. Zarudny, too often described 

 new races, without sufficient reference to the work of ornithologists in Western 

 Europe. 



In this paper I always refer to a species by its binomial name, unless actual 

 specimens were obtained for comparison. This is perhaps an unnecessary 

 refinement for in most cases one could confidently give a sub- specific name on 

 geographical grounds. Though there is little that is unexpected in the present 

 paper I feel that it has value, partly because we resided some time in the 

 country, partly because as a result of our collecting a number of previously 

 described sub-species have now been critically examined and compared with 

 the great collections at Tring and the British Museum. As will be seen below 

 I have felt justified in sinking a number of sub-species described by Zarudny 

 and others. 



We find that we have added but two sub-species to the Persian avifauna, 

 Galerida cristata subtaurica and Passer domesticus biblicus, and the first of these 

 only appears on the Persian list in substitution for G. c. caucasica. The most 

 striking thing about the fauna which we saw was the extremely sharp line of 

 division between the forests of Gilan and the semidesert plateau. This is dealt 

 with in some detail below, but is already well known, principally from Wither- 

 by's papers (1910). A point to which perhaps less attention has been directed, 

 but which is now quite clear, is the intimate connection between the fauna of 

 Persian Azerbaijan, or N. W. Persia generally, and that of Anatolia and Asia 

 Minor generally; this is exemplified by the following species and sub-species : — 

 Petronia p. exigua, Galerida cristata subtaurica, Eremophila alpestris penicillata, 

 Acredula caudata tephronota and Anthoscopus pendulinus persimilis. The 

 following too belong to this distinctively Western element though they are rather 

 Syrian than Anatolian birds : — Passer domesticus biblicus, Ammomanes deserti 

 {frater cuius ?), Cettia cetti orientalis and Turdus merula syriacus. 



