290 



HIMANTOPUS. 



Literature. Plates. — Dresser, Birds of Europe, vii. pi. 534 ; Gould, Birds of Gt. Britain, iv. pi. 53. 



Habits. — Seebohm, British Birds, iii. p. 74. 

 Eggs. — Seebohm, British Birds, pi. 24. figs. 2, 5. 



Specific 

 characters. 



Geographi- 



The Common Avocet may be distinguished by the colour of its forehead, crown, and 

 hind neck, which are black in the adult and brown in young in first plumage. Its white 

 innermost secondaries when adult are also peculiar to the species ; in young in first plumage 

 they are greyish brown obscurely barred with white. 



The increase of population and the drainage of marshes have restricted the breeding- 

 cal distribu- places of the Avocet in Europe to the islands ofi" the coasts of Denmark and Holland, the 

 marshes of Southern Spain, the delta of the Rhone, and the lagoons on the shores of the 

 Black Sea. To Southern Scandinavia and the rest of Central and Southern Europe, with 

 the exception above mentioned, the Avocet has become, as it is in our islands, only an 

 accidental visitor ; but further east it is more abundant, breeding in Palestine and Persia, 

 where it is a resident, and in North Turkestan, the extreme south-west of Siberia, South-east 





Mongolia, and South Dauria, where it is a summer visitor, wintering in China, Formosa, 

 Hainan, India, and occasionally Ceylon. It has been recorded from the main island of 

 Japan. In Asia Minor it is principally known on passage, though a few are said to remain 

 during the winter ; and it is said to breed throughout Africa in suitable localities. It is 

 common on the west coast of Madagascar, and probably breeds there. 



