ARDEA* GULARIS. 
(THE ASHY HERON.) 
Arclea gularis, Bose, Actes Soc. dTIist. Nat. i. p. 4, t. 2 (1792) ; Von Heuglin, Ora. N.Ost- 
Afr. ii. p. 1059 (1873). 
Ardea asha (Sykes), P. Z. S. 1832, p. 157 ; Layard, Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. 1854, xiv. p. 110. 
Herodias asha (Sykes), Blyth, Cat. B. Mus. A. S. B. p. 280 (1849). 
Idemiegretta asha (Sykes), Jerdon, B. of lnd. iii. p. 747 (1864) ; Holdsw. P. Z. S. 1872, p. 477. 
Demiegretta gularis (Boie), Hume, Str. Feath. 1873, p. 254, et 1876, p. 465, et 1879, p. 114 
(List B. of lnd.). 
Slate-coloured Ileron, Sykes; Beef-Heron of some. Kala bagla, Hind. (Jerdon). 
Note. The bill is slightly curved in this species and its allies. 
A dull female (Ceylon). Length 25*0 inches ; wing 1 0*8 ; tail 4‘0 ; tarsus 3*7 ; bare tibia 2*3 ; middle toe 2*6, its claw 
0*42 ; hind toe 1*2 ; bill to gape 4*3, at front 3*7. Pectination of middle claw rather coarse. — Adult male and 
female (Sindh), Length 24*25 to 27*5 ; tail from vent 3*0 to 3*8 ; wing 10*0 to 11*4 ; tarsus 3*0 to 4*4 ; bill at front 
3*6 to 4*1 : weight 1 lb. to 1 lb. 4 oz. {Hume). (Bombay : white variety) Length 24*1 inches ; wing 10*2 ; tail 3*8 ; 
tarsus 3*8; bill from gape 4*2 {Hume). (Egypt) Length 24*0 ; wing 10*25 to 11*25; tarsus 4*16 to 4*1 ; bill at 
front 3*68 to 3*84 {Von Heuglin) : the measurements for tarsus in the latter case are abnormal. 
(Ceylon) Iris golden yellow ; bill brownish yellow, paling to yellowish at the tip ; c-ulmen between nostrils dark brown ; 
gape greenish ; tibia and just below the knee brown ; tarsus green, paling to greeuish yellow at the tips of the toes. 
Head (with crest of two attenuated feathers 3| inches in length), neck, upper surface, and wings dark slate-blue, the 
scapulars and lower fore-neck plumes pale or grey-slate, the former decomposed, but the barbs joining near the 
tip to form a lanceolate web, which reaches to within 1 inch of the tip of the tail ; lesser wing-coverts aud rump 
nigrescent ; primary -coverts and the feathers at their base on the edge of the wing pure white (the fourth feather 
of these coverts on the right wing is slate-coloured in the specimen under consideration) ; chin and throat up to a 
level with the gape white, terminating in a point on the centre of the fore neck 6 inches from the chin ; under 
surface from the chest to the under tail-coverts blackish slate ; under wing slate-blue, the lesser under coverts 
nigrescent. 
The white primary-coverts (as proved by the presence of a dark feather on one wing) is an abnormal development of 
white in this specimen. Mr. Hume has recently called attention (‘ Stray Eeath." 1878, vii. p. 453) to a similar 
specimen shot in Kutch by Capt. Butler. 
White variety. Not uufrequently examples of this species are found pure white throughout. These are not youug 
birds, as was supposed by Jerdon, for Yon Heuglin states that he found young nearly all wdiite and others ash- 
grey in nests. 
Young. The nestling, according to Yon Heuglin, is either white, variegated more or less with brownish grey, or dusky 
ash-grey, and these appear to turn as yearlings into pure white or ashy grey respectively. The colour of the 
latter is much paler than in old birds ; and they have, says Mr. Hume, a good deal of white about the abdomen 
aud vent, and occasionally on the centre of the breast, and want the crest and breast-plumes. The absence of the 
ci*est seems to mark them as adolescent birds, and distinguishes them from crested adults with such a development 
of white as I have noticed above. It is, however, possible that old birds with white wing-coverts may have been 
thus plumaged from the nest. 
* I do not adopt the genus Demiegretta for this species, as structurally and in character of plumage it is, I consider, 
a true Heron. Its marine habits are certainly abnormal ; but the Common Heron is, in England, much seen oil the sea- 
shore in the autumn ; and the Blue Heron of Australia {A. novce-hollandice), by no means a marine species, may be 
considered to connect the Eeef-IIerons with restricted Ardea. The Demiegretta section, in which a white plumage is 
occasionally assumed, seems to lead to the next subgenus, Ilerodias, or White Herons. 
