426 A PRACTICAL HANDBOOK OF BRITISH BIRDS. 



PUFFINUS ASSIMILIS 



339- Puffinus assimilis baroli * Bp.— THE MADEIRAN LITTLE 

 SHEARWATER. 



Puffinus baroli Bonaparte, Consp. Gen. Av., 11, p. 204 (1857 — 



"Mediterranean," Desertas, Canaries. Name ex Bonelli MS., who put 



it on a specimen said to be from Mediterranean. Restricted typical 



locality : Desertas) . 



Puffinus godmani Allen, Auk, 1908, p. 339. (Madeira. From literature.) 



Puffinus obscurus atlanticus Rothschild and Hartert, Bull. B.O.C., xxvii, 



p. 43 (1911 — North Atlantic Islands. Type from Porto Santo near 



Madeira). 



Puffinus obscurus (nee Gmelin), Yarrell, iv, p. 27 ; P. assimilis nee Gould, 



Saunders, p. 743 ; P. bailloni Bonaparte, Godman, Mon. Petrels, p. 138. 



Description. — Adult male and female. Winter and summer. — 

 Whole upper -parts black with a slight slaty tinge most marked 

 when feathers fresh when also they have indications of white tips ; 



1 



The Madeiran Little Shearwater (Puffinus assimilis baroli). 



upper edge of lores, round eye and down sides of neck to sides of 

 upper-breast mottled white and dark slate-grey, feathers having 

 narrow white tips and dark slate -grey subterminal mottlings and 

 irregular barrings ; rest of lores and under -parts white ; lateral 

 under tail -coverts with outer webs wholly or partly dark slate - 

 grey (varying individually) and often with two or three longest 

 under tail-coverts mostly black, sometimes with white tips and 

 sometimes more or less mottled white ; feathers of lower-flanks 

 with most of inner webs and usually tips white, outer webs as 

 upper-parts ; axillaries white often with dark slate -grey bases or 



* It is somewhat uncertain what was meant by the name obscurus, and 

 therefore it has been proposed by Mathews not to adopt it for this species, and 

 I agree that it is perhaps better to avoid it, and that Puffinus assimilis Gould, 

 Syn. B. Austral., pt. iv, add., p. 7 (1838 — " New South Wales," but later said 

 to be from Norfolk I.) is better. In the B.O.U. list (1915) this Shearwater 

 is called Puffinus obscurus baroli, but I have fully explained (Brit. B., vin, 

 p. 282, 1915) that in my view it is not advisable to adopt the name baroli, 

 and I have therefore called this subspecies godmani. This, however, being a 

 question not of rules but whether the diagnosis is applicable or not to the 

 bird in question, it has been decided by a majority of the interested authors 

 of this work that the name baroli shall not be rejected. — E.H. 



