490 



SCOLOPAX. 



Synonymy. Xylocota jamesoni, Bonap. Compt. Rend. xli. p. 660 (1855). 



Gallinago jamesoni (Bonap.), Sclater §• Salvin, Exotic Orn. p. 196 (1869). 

 Scolopax jamesoni (Bonap.), Seebohm, Ibis, 1886, p. 130. 



Literature. 



Plates . — Unfigured . 



Habits. — Described by Simons, who met with this species at an elevation of 11,000 feet on the 

 Sierra Nevadas, in Colombia, as a very rare and shy bird, dodging amongst the tufts of 

 grass in swampy places. 



Eggs. — Unknown. 



Specific 

 characters. 



Nearest 

 ally. 



Geographi- 

 cal distrihu- 

 tion. 



Jameson's Snipe has many characters in common with the Typical Woodcocks, but 

 the markings on the crown are longitudinal, and there are no traces of the silvery white tips 

 on the under surface of the tail-feathers so conspicuous in that little group. It has a long 

 thick bill and a short thick tarsus ; the claw of the hind toe is very small, and the tibia is 

 feathered almost, if not quite, to the joint, the latter character being sufficient to exclude 

 it from the Typical Snipes. It has short primaries and long secondaries, and in other 

 respects bears a superficial resemblance to the Wood-Snipe (8. nemoricola), but the restricted 

 number of its tail-feathers excludes it from the group of Aberrant Snipes. 



The tail of 8. jamesoni differs so much from that of S. nemoricola, and resembles so 

 much that of 8. stricklandi, that there can be little doubt that the true affinities of the two 

 South-American species are with each other rather than with the species which seem, in 

 other respects, to be their East- Asian representatives. The variation in width of the four 

 outer tail-feathers of Jameson's Snipe is from "2 to - 5 inch, and their colour is very 

 grey and the bars somewhat obscure. The six central feathers scarcely differ from those of 

 Strickland's Snipe. Both species have only 14 tail-feathers, all of which are barred. 



Of the group of Semi- Woodcocks to which it consequently belongs, the last-mentioned 

 character excludes two, 8. imperialis and 8. aucklandica, both of which have three or more 

 tail-feathers on each side plain brown without any bars. Two others, 8. undulata and 

 8. gigantea, are excluded by the first-mentioned character (having the tibia bare of 

 feathers for some distance above the joint), and are further excluded by the distinct traces 

 of bars on the inner webs of their primaries. The only other Semi- Woodcock is 8. strick- 

 landi, which is the nearest ally of Jameson's Snipe, and may possibly prove to be only 

 subspecifically distinct from it ; but in Strickland's Snipe the breast and belly are uniform 

 buff without any bars, whilst in Jameson's Snipe they are dull white barred with brown. 



Jameson's Snipe is a resident in the mountain plateaux of the northern Andes, where 

 it breeds at a high elevation. It was originally described by Bonaparte ' from examples 

 obtained by Jameson near Quito in Ecuador. It has since been obtained by Fraser on the 



1 Of the types one is in the collection of Canon Tristram, and the other in mine. They are labelled 

 " Quitian Andes, W. Jameson," and were bought for a few pence at the sale of Sir William Jardine's birds 

 when that magnificent collection was recklessly thrown away for a mere trifle. The old story, " somebody 

 blundered." 



