HJEMATOPUS. 299 



Genus HtEMATOPUS, Linnceus. 



H^MATOPUS LONGIROSTRIS, Vieilloi. 



White-breasted Oyster-catcher. 



Goy,ld, Handbk. Bds. Aust., Vol. ii., sp. 498, p. 215. 



This bird is distributed all over the coast line of Australia. It 

 deposits its eggs two or three in number on the small islands and 

 rocky headlands, during August g,nd the four following months. 

 Specimens in the Australian Museum Collection, taken by Mr. J. 

 A. Thorpe at Fraser Island, Wide Bay, Queensland, are of a pale 

 stone colour, thickly spotted and blotched all over with irregular 

 shaped brownish-black markings, and nearly obsolete spots and 

 dashes of the same colour, appearing as if beneath the surface of 

 the shell. Length (A) 2-2.5 inches x 1-57 inch ; (B) 2-27 inches 

 X 1'55 inch. 



A set in the Dobroyde Collection taken by Mr. John Ramsay 

 at Cape Upstart on the 28th of August 1882, are a light stone 

 colour, with blotches, smears, and angular lines of different shades 

 of dark umber and black, together with subsurface markings of 

 the same colour, in one specimen (A), forming an ill-defined zone 

 at the larger apex. Length (A) 2-25 x 1 '54 inches; (B)2-27x 

 1-55 inches ; (C) 2-24 x 1-55 inches. 



Specimens in my collection taken on King Island, Bass's 

 Straits, and the coast of South Australia, give the same average 

 measurements. 



Like many sea-birds' eggs they show great variation, both in 

 the colour and disposition of their markings. 



Hab. Port Darwin and Port Essington, Gulf of Carpentaria, 

 Cape York, Rockingham Bay, Port Denison, Wide Bay District, 

 Richmond and Clarence Rivers Districts, New South .Wales, 

 Victoria and .South Australia, Tasmania, West and South-west 

 Australia, South Coast New Guinea. (Ramsay.) 



