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Show 2 THE SECRETARY OX THE TRANSVAAL BUSTARD. [Jan. 10, month of December 1903 were 54 in number. Of these 19 were acquired by presentation and 35 were received on deposit. The total number of deaths during the same period was 130. The Secretary exhibited two skins of adult male specimens of Trachelotis barrovii, the common cinnamon-coloured Bustard of the Transvaal, and made the following remarks on them :- These fine skins were sent to me by Captain Richard Crawshay, F.Z.S., who shot them at Piet Retief, Transvaal, and at his request are going to the National Collection. Captain Crawshay writes that these birds, although very common at Piet Retief, are extremely wary and cunning, but if taken unawares may be approached by moving round them in lessening circles. At sunrise and sunset their sonorous call "chakwaka; kwaka" may be heard on all sides, but the birds themselves are seldom seen and are silent by day and night. Captain Crawshay observed that the feet and bills of the birds had a strong odour of formic acid, and he believes from examination of the contents of the stomachs that they feed largely on termites and red ants. 1 have myself carefully examined the stomachs of two specimens which he was kind enough to send me. That of one specimen was full of Indian corn. with remains of some pointed leaves, and a number of broken fragments of large, yellowish-red ants. The stomach of the other specimen was filled by a brown mass of about the appearance and consistency of shag tobacco, and was composed of vegetable fibres with innumerable fragments of small ants and some pieces of the integument of beetles. I have compared these skins carefully with the small collection at the Natural History Museum. There is a good deal of variation in the coloration of adult males. In most of the specimens the cinnamon-brown of the back of the neck is continued some little way between the shoulders, but in one specimen the dusky colour extends to the beginning of the neck. The webs of some of the inner primaries are white rather than yellow. 7'. barrovii appears to be closely similar to T. senegalensis. In the British Museum Catalogue of Birds (vol. xxiii. 1804, pp. 310 312) there is some confusion as to the colouring of the inner primaries of T. senegalensis, which, in the description of that bird, are correctly stated to have white or pale tawny on the inner webs, while later, in the description of T. barrovii, it is stated that -some of the inner primaries are marked with sandy colour at the base of the inner web, whereas they are entirely black in T. senegalensis" In the specimens of both species that I have examined, the colouring of these feathers is alike, white or pale tawny on the inner webs. It is given as a specific distinction that in T. barrovii the tail-feathers are devoid of the second band of black across the dorsal surface. These feathers vary in T. barrovii; in one of my specimens the feathers have the broad black tip and a second band of black higher up, precisely as in |
