14



Correspondence



CORRESPONDENCE



CHESTNUT-WINGED STARLINGS


Sirs, —With reference to your footnote on my letter in the December

Magazine with regard to my Chestnut-winged Amydrus, may I point

out that in Gould’s Birds of Asia, vol. v, there is a coloured plate of

A. tristrami exactly resembling my pair of Amydrus from Africa. I

cannot find Hagiopsar tristrami in Gould’s works. He names it Amydrus

tristrami, with no synonym, and wrote : “ There cannot be the slightest

doubt as to Amydrus tristrami being a good species. It is nearly allied

to A. fulvipennis of South and South-Western Africa. The size of both

species is the same.”


That my birds may be A. morio I do not dispute, but judging by

Gould’s plate they appear as identical with A. tristrami.


These birds seem to be hardy, for although only lately imported

they are thriving in an outdoor aviary, and even moulted in November


Hubert D. Astley.


[Sharpe separated the Palestine species from the African birds

{Amydrus), calling it Hagiopsar, of which genus it is the only repre¬

sentative. — Eds.]



