PSITTAOID^ PCEOCEPHALUS 229 



(Bt. Mus.), Lake Ngami (Bt. Mus.) ; Ehodesia— Tati (Gates), 

 Umfuli river (Ayres) ; German south-west Africa — Gndonga (Bt. 

 Mus.), Gkavango river (Eriksson in S. A. Mus.) ; Portuguese east 

 Africa — Tete (Livingstone and Alexander). 



Mr. Gscar Neumann has recently divided this species into 

 four sub-species, from Abyssinia, German east Africa, Angola, and 

 the Transvaal respectively. Should this hold good our species will 

 stand as Pyocephalus meyeri transvaalensis. 



Habits. — Meyer's Parrot is perhaps the most widely distributed 

 and the commonest of South African parrots. It is found in pairs 

 or small parties among high thorn bushes or along the wooded 

 banks of rivers and periodical streams. As with other parrots its 

 flight is rapid and headlong and its note a shrill scream. Holub is 

 the only observer who has noticed the nesting habits of this 

 species ; it builds in a hole in a tree, either making it itself or 

 adapting to its needs that of some smaller bird. Holub did not 

 discover the eggs, vrhich are doubtless white like those of other 

 parrots. 



This bird is often kept as a pet and becomes exceedingly tame ; 

 it is to be seen on many of the farms in the western Transvaal 

 flying in and out of the houses and taking food from the hand. 

 It will eat bread, cooked and uncooked fruits and vegetables, 

 grain and even raw meat, but this latter diet is stated by Holub 

 to cause the birds subsequently to pull out their feathers, a trick 

 not uncommon among caged parrots. 



488. Poeocephalus rueppelli. Bilppell's Parrot. 



Psittaous ruppelUi, O. B. Gray, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1848, p. 125, pi. 5 ; 



Sharpe, ed. Layard's B. 8. Afr. p. 196 (1876). 

 Pceocephalus ruppeUi, Strihl. and Sclat. Contr. Ornith. 1852, p. 156 



[Damaraland] ; Ourney in Andersson's. B. Damaraland, p. 214 



(1872) ; P. L. Sclater, Proc. Zool. Soc. 1882, pj). 421-577, pi. 42 ; 



Salvadori, Cat. B. M. xx, p. 375 (1891) ; FlecJe, Journ. Ornith. 1894, 



p. 395 ; Shelley, B. Afr. i, p. 139 (1896). 

 Pionias ruppelli, Finsch, Papag. ii, p. 498 (1868). 



Description. Adult. — General colour above and below smoky- 

 brown ; sides of the face and ear-coverts more silvery ; lesser wing- 

 coverts on the bend of the wing, edge of the wing and under 

 wing-coverts, yellow ; tibial plumes orange-yellow. 



Iris orange ; bill, feet, and toes dark horn. 



