THE



Avicultural Magazine


THE JOURNAL OF THE

AVICULTURAL SOCIETY


Fourth Series. —Vol. X.—No. 4 .—All rights reserved. APRIL, 1932.



THE SPLENDID GRASS-PARRAKEET


In my note on Neophema splendida in the February number of

this Journal I referred to a pair acquired by the Zoological Society

in 1871 and stated that “ from these a young bird was hatched the

following year, though whether this was reared to maturity or not I

have been unable to discover Further research has shown that the

printed records are incorrect, and it is almost certain that the species

has never bred in captivity ! On page 328 of the eighth edition of the

Zoological Society’s official List of Vertebrated Animals, published in

1883, appears the following entry :—


“ Euphema splendida, Gould. Splendid Grass Parrakeet.


Hob. South Australia.


a. Male ; b. Female. Purchased, 30th January, 1871.


c. Purchased, 21st June, 1872.


d. Hatched in the Gardens, 21st July, 1872.”


I have looked up the daily occurrence records from which the List of

Vertebrates was compiled and I find that on 21st June, 1872, this

species is not mentioned, whereas on 21st July, 1872, the following

entry occurs : “ 1 Splendid Grass Parrakeet, Euphema splendida ,


purchased of Mr. A. Jamrach, 205.,” so there can be little doubt that

all the authors who have mentioned this species since the 1883 List

was printed—Euss, Butler, Neunzig, Tavistock, Hopkinson, and myself,

have been led astray by an obvious clerical error in the compilation

of that List.



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