AUSTEALIAN PRATINCOLE. 
primaries pale brown and edged with white on the inner webs, the shaft of the 
outer primary conspicuously white, secondaries uniform olive-brown ; upper tail- 
coverts white ; base of tail and outer pair of tail-feathers also white with a broad 
subterminal black band, wliich becomes much narrower on the outer feathers, 
tipped with brown on the outer webs and white on the inner ones ; lores blackish ; 
throat inclining to white ; flanks and abdomen maroon-chestnut ; vent and under 
taU-coverts white ; axillaries and under wing-coverts black ; bill, base scarlet, tip 
black ; iris and feet brown. Total length 210 mm. ; culmen 15, wing 198, 
tail 60, tarsus 50. 
Adult female. Similar to the adult male. 
Immature. Have very broad reddish-buff edges to the feathers of the upper-surface, 
giving it a uniform appearance. 
Nest. A depression in the soil. 
Eggs. Clutch, two ; ground-colour pale stone, marked aU over (sometimes very heavily) 
with irregular-shaped markings of dark brown and underlying ones of grey ; 
axis 32-33 mm., diameter 23.5 to 24.5. 
Breeding-season. September to February. 
Mr. J. P. Rogers found these birds near Wyndham, in North-west Australia. 
They were fairly plentiful during the wet season (December, January, and 
February) ; in March they left the district. The same man also collected it 
on Melville Island in May 1912, and in Van Diemen Gulf in September. 
Mr. Edwin Ashby tells me he received a specimen in the flesh from 
Lake Frome, South Australia, in September, 1909. And that about twenty 
years ago large numbers came down to the Adelaide Plains. 
“ This somewhat singular bird is one of the few migratory species that 
visit this part of the colony [interior of New South Wales] and remain during 
the intense heat of summer. As a rule it arrives towards the end of 
September and departs about the end of February. During that interval 
it breeds, and the place chosen for this purpose, and in fact its habitat 
during its stay, are the bare patches of ground, entirely destitute of 
vegetation, so frequent on the plains here. Some of these bare patches are 
of considerable extent, and the surface of the ground is broken up \ into 
countless small pieces from the size of a pea to that of a walnut, giving 
the appearance of having been chipped over with a hoe. This is partly 
due to the nature of the soil and to the intense heat and dryness of the 
climate which causes the surface to crack in all directions and become 
quite loose. It is on these loose patches that the Glareola deposits its eggs, 
two in number. It makes no nest but simply lays its eggs on the bare 
surface of the loose broken ground, as so much do they assimilate in form 
and colour to the surrounding lumps of earth, that unless the bird is seen to 
move off them a person might walk on them and not observe them, and on 
several occasions I have taken my eyes off the spot for a few seconds and 
then had considerable difficulty in distinguishing the eggs again. 
VOL. in. 
325 
