GREY-HEADED BLACKBIRD. 
web dark brownish-olive ; tail-feathers like the primary-quills ; lores chestnut-buif ; ear- 
coverts blackish-brown, mesially streaked with fawn-colour ; a spot behind the eye and on 
the sides of the neck chestnut-buff ; chin and throat chestnut-buff with a line of blackish- 
brown down each side ; chest, breast and sides of the body chestnut, each feather with 
buff shaft-streaks and with a blackish spot at the extremity ; axillaries and under wing- 
coverts sooty; under tail-coverts brownish-buff, broadly streaked with white. Bill 
blackish-brown, eyes dark grey, feet dark dull brown. Collected near the Cascades, 
Norfolk Island, on the 8th of January, 1912. 
Nest and eggs. The nests are large, fairly deep. Composed of stalks, fibres, dry leaves, grasses and 
lichens or moss, but not matted together with mud ; lined with skeleton leaves and flat soft 
grasses. These birds seem to nest at various seasons. Most of the eggs were found from the 
21st of September to the 23rd of December, but clutches were also taken on the 29th of 
April, 1912, 25th of April, 1913, and the 8th of May, 1913, and there is a young bird of the 
20th of March. The clutches are of 2 or 3 eggs, in one case 4. Their ground-colour is 
greenish-white or pale green, sometimes creamish or pinkish-white. They are marked with 
smaller or largef rufous or brownish-red spots and patches, and some deeper lying pale 
bluish or pinkish-grey patches ; one egg is pale blue, with the markings restricted to the 
thick end. The clutch of 4 is darker bluish and covered all over with small, pale, rufous 
spots, thus resembling eggs of the European Blackbird or Bedwing, while the majority of 
the others resemble those of the Mistlo Thrush, except that the latter are larger. The eggs 
measure : 32 - 2 X 20, 34 X 20 (the most elliptical clutch) ; 32 X 20‘5, 3T5 X 2T6; 
29- 5 X 22T, 28-5 X 22 ; 29'5 X 22, 30 X 22-7 ; 275 X 21, 28‘3 X 20'3 ; 292 X 21, 
29T X 21, 28-5 X 21 ; 30 X 21, 29 X 206 ; 28'6 X 21, 29'6 X 21\3; 293 X 22 7, 
30- 5 X 23 ; 28'5 X 206, 28‘5 X 21 ; 295 X 203, 29‘8 X 20, 29 8 x 20, 29 X 20 1 
(the green Blackbird-like clutch) ; 28 X 21, 28'7 X 21 ; 28‘6 X 21*4, 28‘2 X 21 ; 3T5 X 21, 
31 X 21 ; 32-7 X 22-3,30 6 X 2T3.28-5 X 20‘5 ; 29 X 21,30'S X 2T8 ; 30 X 22, 29 X22 ; 
30 X 2T7, 28 X 21 ; 28'6 X 20, 27'3 X 20, 28'3 X 205 : 30 X 21, 27 X 21 ; 29 X 2T3, 
29'5 X 21-5 ; 28 X 22, 28 X 2T5 mm. 
Breeding-season. September to December, April and May. 
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