BLUE THRUSH.
Petrocincla cyanus, Vig.

Le Merle bleu.

Like its congener, the Rock Thrush (Perrocinela saxatihs), the present species is a native of the rocky and
mountainous districts of Europe, particularly towards the south, being very abundant in Piedmont and the
Apennines, and also of common occurrence throughout Spain, Sardinia, Italy and the Levant. It is met
with also in the South of France, but is rare in Switzerland. India and China produce a bird in every respect
identical, with the exception of size, those which are received from Asia being considerably smaller than their
European representative. Although the congenial habitat of the Blue Thrush is the rocky scenery of
mountain chains, among which it breeds and remains throughout the year, still in many of its characters it
seems to constitute a link between the more typical form of the genus Petrocincla and that of the true
Thrushes, which latter it approaches in the proportions of the tarsi and tail. In the typical Petrocincle,
(P. savatils, for example,) the tarsi are strong and very elongated; but the tail is short, a conformation in
harmony with strictly terrestrial habits. In the present bird, the tarsi are more moderate and the tail more
developed ; still, however, as its habits, style of plumage and general outline declare, it is in every sense a
member of the genus in which it is now placed.

The Blue Thrush is shy and solitary, dwelling with its mate in the still and sequestered recesses of the
rocks, in the clefts of which it builds its nest, though this is not always the case, as it often chooses the
crumbling walls of lonely towers or buildings, and sometimes the holes of trees, in which to rear its young.
The eggs are dull greenish white. Its food, like that of its congener, consists of grasshoppers, large insects
in general, and wild berries.

The male and female exhibit considerable difference in their plumage, the young males of the year
resembling the latter. In the adult male, the whole of the upper surface is of a deep greyish blue, many of
the feathers being margined with grey; the wings and tail are black ; the under surface is of a lighter blue
than the upper, with obscure narrow bars of brown edged with white on the chest and abdomen ; the beak
and tarsi are black.

The female has the whole of the upper surface brown, obscurely barred with ash colour ; the wings and tail
blackish brown, each feather having a blueish margin ; the throat light brown, the feathers tipped and edged
with black; the chest and under surface varied with light brown, grey and black, in pointed scales and
transverse bars.

The young males may be seen in various stages between this style of colouring and the rich blue of the
bird in its maturity.

The Plate represents a male and female in their adult plumage, of the natural size.