PH(ENlCOPTEiirS KOSEUS. 3 



Habitat. — Southern Europe (practically confined to the coa.st-line), 

 Asia on the east and south-east, and the whole of Africa. 



In India it is found more or less throughout the Continent, but I can 

 find no record of its ever extending to Burma, and in Hume's collection 

 there are none from the east of Bengal or Assam, though from the latter 

 place there is in the British Museum Collection one skin marked " ,/■. Juv. 

 sk. Assam,"' obtained by McClelland. It is very common on the major 

 part of the west coast, and extends quite down to Ceylon, where Legge 

 states that it is seen in large numbers, both on the west and east coast. 

 Thence it extends northwards, and is common in certain parts of Madras, 

 but in Eastern Bengal is a decidedly rare bird. I have once seen it during 

 the cold weather in the Sunderbands, and there are a few other recorded 

 instances. In the widely-known and shot-over Chilka Lake, in Orissa, it 

 is fairly frequently met with, though I hear less frequently and in smaller 

 numbers than formerly, probably owing to the lake being more accessible 

 to sportsmen nowadays than it used to be. Elsewhere in Bengal it is 

 only a casual flock that is seen in the cold weather. 



Legge seems to have thought that the Flamingo bred in (yeylon ; but 

 his ideas on this subject have never been confirmed, though it is more 

 than possible that he was correct, as Mr. W. N. Fleming reports fi-om 

 Tuticorin that the Flamingo is fairly common throughout the district, and 

 that a large fioek, numbering some 300 birds, was still in the neighbour- 

 hood of that place in July 1898. 



His Highness the Ilao of Cutch is the only observer who has actuidly 

 found a regular nesting-place of the Flamingo within Indian limits. In a 

 letter to Mr. Lester he recorded that he had obtained some twentv eoes 

 and two young from some place in the Runn of Cutch *. 



Its principal breeding-places lie in Africa, and in Asia, in Arabia, and 

 Persia, where they collect during the breeding-season in countless numbers. 

 It also breeds in Spain, and is said to do so in the Ehone Delta. Hume 

 and, after him, Barnes (Jour. B. N. H. S. vi, no. 3, p. 285) have com- 

 mented on the curious and untidy habit these birds possess of dropping 

 eggs about in a casual sort of manner, and in this way a good many have 

 been found in India. 



Other ornithologists have noted this habit, and it seems to be one 

 connnon to the whole genus, as Barnes notes havin<>' obtained eogs thus 

 which he considered belonged to the Lesser Flamingo. 



* In January, Is'Jl, IMF. the Rao of Cutch ])ubli8hed, in tlie .Tournal B. N. IT. S. xv, 

 p. 70(3, a photograph and note on the nests ;iud eggs of the Fianiiiif^o found in tlie Uunn 

 of Cutch. 



J! 2 



