Vol. 5, p. 427-428. October 10, 1931. 



Occasional Papers 



OF THE 



Boston Society of Natural History. 



THE GEOGRAPHIC FORMS OF THE SOMALI SPARROW, 



PASSER CASTANOPTERUS BLYTH. 

 BY HERBERT FRIEDMANN. 1 



The Somali sparrow is stated by Sclater 2 to occur in British 

 Somaliland. However, its range is much more extensive than 

 this. Mearns collected a good series, at Chaffa on the Shoa- 

 Kenyan border, at Hor and the Indunumara Mountains, in 

 northern Kenya Colony in 1912. Van Someren 3 listed 13 speci- 

 mens from Marsabit in 1923, and Captain Keith Caldwell's 

 collectors obtained 9 specimens at Karoli, also in northern 

 Kenya Colony in 1923. Van Someren's are the only published 

 records for Kenya Colony. In 1903 Hammerton obtained a 

 male at Bera, in southern Italian Somaliland. This record 

 published by Witherby 4 constituted a considerable extension of 

 range at the time, but was doubted by Zedlitz 5 who suggested 

 that inasmuch as Hammerton had also collected this species 

 at Upper Sheikh in northern Somaliland in 19Q4, the Bera 

 specimen probably came from there as well. However, in view 

 of the fact that Mearns, van Someren, and Caldwell obtained 

 this species in northern Kenya Colony, Hammerton's record 

 need no longer be looked upon with doubt and suspicion. 



Through the courtesy of the bird department of the Museum 

 of Comparative Zoology, I have been able to compare the birds 

 from northern Kenya Colony and extreme southern Shoa, with 

 typical material from British Somaliland and I find the southern 

 birds to be quite distinct. Van Someren noted that this speci- 



1 Published by permission of the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. 



2 Syst. Avium iEthiop., pt. 2, 1930, p. 723. 



3 Jour. E. Afr. and Uganda Nat. Hist. Soc, 1930, p. 36. 

 •Ibis, 1905, p. 518. 



'Jour. f. Ornith., 1916, p. 45. 



427 



