44 



P.C. RASMUSSEN AND N.J. COLLAR 



which it was kept, and that the owners informed her that it had been 

 bred from cyanocephala at Vogelpark Turnersee. However, the 

 article about this individual (Fuchs 1997), which claimed that it was 

 a great rarity, does not mention its parentage nor even the possibility 

 that intermedia is a hybrid. 



Sane (1977) recalled that in 1972 or 1973 he had seen a bird 

 similar to his first 'intermedia , but that it had been purchased by H. 

 H. Jamsaheb, Nawanagar, India. He had also been told in about 1976 

 that someone in Britain had two or three intermedia, and that 8-10 

 had been imported into Holland in 1 976. An individual was offered 

 for sale in 1976 as 'probably the only known specimen in captivity 

 in the world' (Inskipp and Inskipp 1995). However, we know of no 

 documentation for any of these claimed intermedia. 



In a poster session at the 1996 BirdLife Asia Conference in 

 Coimbatore, India, R. Bhargava exhibited a photo of a captive bird 

 that closely matched the AMNH specimens already examined by 

 PCR. Bhargava (pers. comm. 1996) informed us that such birds were 

 not rare in the pet trade within India, but that the illegality of this 

 trade makes documentation difficult. He had obtained as many as 

 five individuals from traders at one time, although one of these has 

 since been ringed and released at a news conference (Anon. 1998) 

 and three have died and been preserved as specimens. Bhargava's 

 three specimens appear from photographs to be indistinguishable 

 from AMNH intermedia, but definite, verifiable data on their prov- 

 enance appear to be lacking. 



Known hybrid cyanocephala x himalayana 

 After the publication of Walters (1985), Sedgemore informed M. P. 

 Walters (pers. comm., 1995) that he had crossed himalayana and 

 cyanocephala in captivity and obtained intermedia-like hybrids. 

 Beginning in the late 1970s Sedgemore tried pairing captive 

 himalayana andcyanocephala to determine whether Husain's ( 1 959) 

 hypothesis was correct (M. Sedgemore, in litt. 1997), but his adult 

 male cyanocephala (age unknown) and five-year-old female 

 himalayana refused to bond. In the mid-1980s he tried pairing 

 different individuals of the same species, but again without result 

 (M. Sedgemore, in litt. 1997). Then in 1991 he housed an immature 

 female himalayana and immature male cyanocephala together, and 

 these showed pair behaviour that year but did not breed. In 1 992, of 

 three eggs laid, two were clear and one was fertile but did not hatch, 

 and in 1993 three more eggs were produced, only one of which 

 hatched but the chick died at two weeks of age. Finally, in 1994, all 

 three eggs laid hatched and the chicks fledged, as did chicks from 

 two of three eggs laid in 1995 (M. Sedgemore, in litt. 1997). All the 

 hybrids - four males and one female - were still alive and in adult 

 plumage when we saw them in September 1997. 



Photos of Sedgemore's hybrids with their parents show that the 

 mother was a typical himalayana and the male parent a typical 

 cyanocephala, the latter being additionally confirmed by the speci- 

 men. All these photos and our direct examination, photographs, and 

 measurements confirm the identity of the hybrids with AMNH 

 intermedia. The heads of all four adult male hybrids were coloured 

 as in the five AMNH adult specimens, with only slight variability 

 among them. Their ceres were pale fleshy horn; their maxillae 

 orange-red on the basal two-thirds and with yellowish tips; their 

 lower mandibles were pale; their eyering skin was pale greyish; and 

 their feet and claws were pale greyish-pink. All had a broad pale 

 greenish-blue hindcollar, lesser wing coverts, rump, and underwing 

 coverts, the undersurfaces of the rectrices yellow with the outer 

 webs bluish proximally, and the tail tips slightly broadened and pale 

 yellowish from above. 



The single female hybrid was less distinctive but still possessed 

 characteristics which should enable recognition of specimens or 



captives. It would be immediately distinguishable from adult 

 himalayana or finschii by its much paler, duller grey head and lack 

 of a narrow black collar, and from males of the above two species by 

 its lack of a maroon wing patch. Its head was drabber grey than adult 

 female cyanocephala, with a pale area in front of the eye much as in 

 juvenile cyanocephala; its upper mandible was heavier and was 

 strongly tinged orange at the base; its lower mandible was pale; it 

 had a slight yellowish collar on the sides of the neck (paler and duller 

 than in adult female cyanocephala and less ochraceous than in 

 female roseata); and it had long, slightly broadened, pale yellow tail 

 tips, which extend much farther proximally on the feather than in 

 cyanocephala. 



Sedgemore (1995) briefly described the juveniles of the first 

 brood. His photos of four of these same hybrids as fresh-plumaged 

 juveniles show that they would be difficult but not impossible to 

 distinguish from those of either parental species. All four hybrids 

 had a pale area on the front of the face (on the forehead, lores, and 

 area around the bill base); greenish-grey auriculars; a dull green 

 crown and nape; and a pale yellowish-green collar contrasting with 

 the head and mantle. From below, the tails of the hybrids were 

 narrowly yellow-tipped. The upper tail surfaces are visible only on 

 two individuals, in which they were greenish-blue with a pale yellow 

 tip. Note that the latter character disagrees with Tavistock's (1933) 

 statement (see below) that the tails of his hybrids were brighter blue 

 than in young cyanocephala and were white-tipped. A photo of one 

 of Sedgemore's 1995 hybrids in direct comparison with its 1994- 

 hatched brother (an adult by then) shows that the juvenile has the 

 upper tail surface more turquoise than the adult male. The young 

 hybrids differed from juvenile himalayana by their smaller bills, 

 their lack of blackish blotches at the bases of the maxillae, their 

 duskier ceres, yellower collar, bluer upper tail surface, and narrower 

 rectrices, and from juvenik cyanocephala by their duller, less 

 yellow collar, and yellowish tail tips. It is uncertain whether juvenile 

 hybrids between cyanocephala and himalayana could reliably be 

 discriminated from youngfinschii, which would be more similar in 

 size and proportions. 



Successful hybridization of male cyanocephala x female 

 himalayana was also achieved earlier by Critchley, who placed an 

 adult male cyanocephala whose mate had just died in a mixed aviary 

 with a placid adult female himalayana that had lived in a pet shop for 

 several years (L. Critchley, in litt. 1998). The birds paired up during 

 the first spring (1989) that they were kept together; from all five eggs 

 laid, chicks hatched and were reared successfully. The fates of four 

 of the young which were sold to a pet shop are unknown, but the 

 remaining male moulted into adult plumage in August 1990 and was 

 in Critchley's aviaries as of May 1998. Several photos, including one 

 of the adult hybrid with its parents, show that Critchley's hybrid 

 matches in every plumage detail the AMNH intermedia series and 

 Sedgemore's male hybrids, and confirm the specific identity of the 

 parents. Finally, a male cyanocephala and female himalayana also 

 hybridized successfully in the aviaries of Mr E. Beale (now de- 

 ceased, M. Sedgemore, pers. comm. 1997), and the pair reared two 

 chicks in 1980. These had yellow tail tips as juveniles (Beale 1981), 

 but this brief description does not enable evaluation of whether they 

 match Rothschild's intermedia in other respects. 



DISCUSSION 



Sane's captives 



Recognizing that the bird in Sane's collection photographed by 

 Wirth (1990) was different from the AMNH material, Arndt (1996) 

 stated that 'specimens caught on the plain of the Indian state of 



