PUFFINTJS CHLOKORHYNCHUS. 



and Bird Islands, and the Hon. Walter Rothschild has adults and nestlings, 

 obtained by M. Thibault on Cousine Island, proving that the species breeds there. 

 Specimens from Reunion and Rodriguez (H. H. Slater) are also in the British Museum. 



The habits of P. chlororhynchus are similar to those of other members of the genus 

 Puffinus, but I am unable to decide, in every case, to which species many of the recent 

 notes published in Australian journals refer, as the ranges of P. chlororhynchus and P. 

 tenuirostris are, in many parts of Australia, coterminous. They are simply spoken of as 

 " Mutton-birds," a name applied equally to both the brown Shearwaters. 



On Lord Howe Island, Mr. Robert Etheridge states that the birds begin to arrive 

 at the latter end of August, and nest in burrows usually hidden under a tussock of 

 grass, or occasionally in a mere depression of the surface. The smell from this 

 Shearwater's abode is, like that of other species of Puffinus, most obnoxious. 

 Macgillivray, Newton, and others, say that these birds not only bite severely, if 

 incautiously handled, but disgorge a quantity of offensive oily matter, the odour of 

 which pervades the whole island. 



On approaching a colony one bird will give the alarm, and a chorus of the most 

 extraordinary sounds proceeds from underground, more resembling the squalling of 

 cats than any other noise. At night, the cries are renewed, till it seems as if the 

 whole island were in distress. 



Mr. Hall says that the young birds are very pugnacious, and if two of them were 

 placed in the same box overnight, one would be found dead in the morning. A similar 

 statement of their ferocity is made by Sir Walter Buller, and Mr. Hall states that the 

 same is true of other Petrels (Ibis, 1902, p. 204). 



Adult. General colour above sooty-brown, the feathers with more or less distinct 

 edges of lighter brown, these edges more evident on the scapulars and inner secondaries, 

 where the feathers are blackish-brown towards the ends ; wing-coverts like the back ; 

 quills blackish, the secondaries shaded with ashy-grey on the outer webs ; tail-feathers 

 black, somewhat lighter on the inner webs of some of the outer ones ; crown of head 

 like the back, but with a slight shade of ashy on the lores, sides of face, and cheeks ; 

 throat more decidedly ashy-grey, becoming duller grey on the fore-neck ; the 

 remainder of the under-surface from the fore-neck downwards dull ashy-brown, with 

 faint indications of rusty edges to the feathers ; under tail-coverts also ashy-brown ; 

 axillaries and under wing-coverts like the breast ; quills dusky below, the lower 

 greater-coverts and the inner webs of the quills rather more ashy. Total length about 

 17.5 inches ; culmen, 1.65 ; wing, 11.6 ; tail, 5.3 ; tarsus, 1.9 ; middle toe and claw, 2.45. 



The description is taken from an adult bird in our own collection, presented to us 

 by Dr. Crowfoot, from Norfolk Island. The specimen figured is also in our collection, 

 from Praslin in the Seychelles Archipelago. 



89 



