OCR Text |
Show 1871.] LETTER FROM MR. W. H. HUDSON. 259 described in my last letter, we have in this country five species of Laridee; but at present I will pass these over, and defer m y descriptions of them until I shall have increased the rather scanty stock of facts I possess in reference to their habits. " I have just become acquainted with a bird never before, I think, obtained in this region-the Upucerthia dumetoria. A pair of these birds (male and female) appeared in a field near my house this winter; and a month after first seeing them I succeeded in shooting both. The male proved to be a trifle the larger; hut in plumage they were alike. They reminded me in all their motions of the Cinclodes fuscus, being, like it, shy and ever ready to take wing, and their flight being irregular, rapid, and near to the earth. The bird also sometimes alights on dry stalks, but more often on the ground, hopping and jerking the tail in a startled manner, and running with extraordinary swiftness over the bare places. These birds were probably winter visitants from Patagonia; but that they regularly migrate so far north is doubtful. The species has been considered, I think, an inhabitant of the Andean regions exclusively; but I have seen one skin obtained on the Atlantic sea-board, in the southern part of this province. " W e have already many indications of approaching spring ; and I regret to find that I have not been able to give so much attention to the habits of our winter species as I had intended to do, or to write so many letters as I had hoped. Before many days the cold season will have gone, and with it the birds that annually visit us from the barren tablelands of Patagonia. When I reflect how few species there are in this sombre-plumaged train, compared with the multitude that come to us in summer wearing the gay livery of the tropics, I am forced to think that Patagonia must indeed be poor in species. Yet in the interior of that country there is a fertile region, abounding in forests, and watered by a great river and its tributary streams. Whatever birds inhabit such a region certainly do not visit us, all our winter visitants, except two of the Hawks, being lovers of open bare plains, and alighting almost exclusively on the ground. It is not, however, impossible that in those districts of Patagonia adapted to the habits of Passerine birds many resident species may exist. Most anxiously do I wait an opportunity of learning something from observation of the ornithology of that country. " I will now furnish vou with a short sketch of our winter birds and their movements. " The Osquita (Centrites niger) and the Cinclodes fuscus are the earliest to appear-the former on bare places, the latter on the margins of streams. Both are very common and found widely distributed. Very interesting in appearance is the silent little Osquita, the bright rufous on its back contrasting prettily with its other colour, the bill, feet, and plumage being intensely black, as if dyed in Indian ink ; the inside of the bill and tongue is bright yellow. When thev first appear the young males have almost as pale an ashy |