EAST 
AUSTRALIAN BLACK OYSTERCATCHER. 
Birds Brit. Mus., Vol. XXIV., p. 118, 1896, this was also merged with 
unicolor. This usage was then continued until Hartert, reporting upon a 
collection of birds from Australia {Nov. Zool., Vol. XII., p. 200, 1905), 
called the Australian birds H. unicolor fuliginosus, writing : “It seems to 
me that Australian specimens of the black Oyster-catcher can easily be distin- 
guished by their bills being much stouter and more rounded in front on the 
culmen, not so sharp, knife-like, as in H. unicolor from New Zealand.” 
In my “ Reference List ” I accepted unicolor as the species-name, and 
admitted three forms for Australia — H. u. fuliginosus, H. u. opthahnicus, and 
H. u. hernieri nov., which I characterised as follows {Nov. ZooL, Vol. XVIII., 
p. 214, 1912) : “ Differs from H. u. fuliginosus in its browner coloration and 
in having a shorter wing and longer tarsus ; wing 263, tarsus 56 ; typical 
bird’s wing 297, tarsus 51.” 
Study of the black Oystercatchers enables me to put forward the following 
summary, which approaches the truth, from the series now available. These 
constitute quite a remarkable group as regards distribution, for the South 
African, Australian, and New Zealand forms seem to constitute one species, 
while the Canary Island bird has been also recently described as subspecificaUy 
distinct from the South African one. It seems quite strange that the South 
African bird should be scarcely separable from the South Australian one while 
the North Australian and New Zealand forms are quite well-marked. 
These birds are brown in the immature and the female is brown, while 
the adult male would seem to be glossy black. Eull-grown first-year birds 
with perfect plumage have shorter wings than old birds, and as usual the 
female is larger than the male. My nomenclature of the species reads : — 
Hcematopus niger niger Temminck ; South Africa. 
Of this form H. capensis Licht. (n.n.), H. niger africanus Bonapafie, and 
H. moquini Bonaparte, may be cited as synonyms. 
Hcematopus niger meadewaldoi Bannerman ; Canary Islands. 
This form is smaller with a longer biU, and shows a white patch at the base 
of the primaries which is not seen in any other form. No authentic records 
are extant of any specimens between South Africa and the Canaries, so that 
the erratic distribution of the species deserves careful study. It cannot be 
that melanism is the source of these Sooty Oystercatchers, for the Pied forms 
are not found at the Canaries or South Africa ; yet that might be adduced as 
the cause of the New Zealand form as it is most plentiful in the South Island 
where so many melanistic forms occur and so many intermediate specimens 
have been met with. But these Black Oystercatchers have relatively more 
powerful legs and feet. 
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