PLATE 



XL. 



GENUS CHARRADRIUS (Linnceus). 



rnHE single species that represents this genus in Australia, differs from its congener, the C. plurialis 

 J- of Europe, in having four auxiliaries. 



CHARRADRIUS ORIENTALIS (Temm. a Schhg.) 



AUSTRALIAN GOLDEN PLOVER. Genus: Charradrius. 



rpHE Australian Golden Plover is generally distributed over Australia, but is nowhere abundant, 

 -L being seen only in small parties at a time. It affects open lands, in the neighborhood of the 

 sea beach, or swampy places ; it swims and Hies rapidly, and so closely approaches the European 

 Golden Plover that a description of the one is a description of the others. 



Dr. Lerdon writes : "The Australian Golden Plover occurs throughout India in open plains, 

 grassy downs, ploughed fields, and on the edges of rivers, lakes, etc., associating in flocks of various 

 magnitudes, and feeding on beetles, and other land insects, worms, etc. Dr. C. Griiffe, writing from 

 Tongatabu, says that it is found on that island all the year round, but is more numerous from 

 October to March, and during the season of emigration. It occurs occasionally on the New Zealand 

 Coast, but apparently only as a straggler, and always in winter plumage. Mr. Swinhoe has given the 

 following account of its identification : — ' Its eggs, four in number, are laid in a loose nest of dried 

 grasses placed in a hollow. They are of a greenish-grey ground color, blotched and spotted with deep 

 blackish sepia, and having obsolete purplish-grey spots. They do not vary in size, are narrowed near 

 the end, and measure l-5in. by 1-lin.' " — Buller's "Birds of New Zealand," page 1), chapter 13. 



At the commencement of the breeding season the breast plumage undergoes a change, the 

 bufty, mottled tint of winter is replaced by indications of black and white, which becomes entirely 

 black by the height of the summer. This developement. however, is seldom seen in the southern 

 latitudes, and the inference is that the birds go elsewhere abroad. 



The full summer plumage shows the whole upper surface and tail very dark brown, each 

 feather having a series of yellowish or whitish spots along the margins ; primaries, dark brown, with 

 white shafts ; tores, sides of face, breast, and all under-surfaces, black, bounded by a broad white 

 mark, which crosses the forehead over the eye, down the sides of the neck, and along the flanks, 

 where it becomes very conspicuous ; under wing-coverts, and the lengthened feathers covering the 

 insertion of the wing uniform pale silvery brown ; irides, dark brown ; bill, dark olive ; legs and feet, 

 leaden grey. {Gould.) 



Habitats : Port Darwin and Port Essington, Gulf of Carpentaria, Cape York, Rockingham 

 Bay, Port Denison, Wide Bay District, Dawson River (G.B.), Richmond and Clarence River 

 Districts, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia, Tasmania, West and South-west Australia, 

 South Coast of New Guinea, New Zealand. 



GENUS CIRREPIDESMUS (Bonaparte). 



f MKTS is the generic term bestowed upon the bird now known to science as Eudromias Veredus. It is 

 -L an inland genus, and is conspicuous during summer by the single band of enfons across the breast. 



