EPIMACHUS MEYE RI, Finsch.

Meyer’s Sickle-billed Bird of Paradise.

Epimachus meyert, Finsch in Madarész, Zeitschr. ges,
D’Hamonv. Bull. Soc. Zool. France, 1886, p.
Papuasia, Age. ii. p. 154 (1890).

Epimachus macleayana, Ramsay, Proc. Linn. Soc. N. S. W
Goodwin, Ibis, 1890, p. 152.

Epimachus macleaye, Meyer, J. f. O. 1889, p. 324 (nom. emend.).—Salvad. Orn. Papuasia, Age. ii,

Cini 30) (1885).—Id. Ibis, iS SOs pase
509.—Meyer, J. f. O. 1889, p. 323.—Salvad. Orn.

 

ales, ii. p. 239 (1887). Meyer, J. f. O. ISSO p22

p. 152 (1890).

 

Tue British Museum possesses a pair of this interesting Bird of Paradise, procured by Mr. A. P. Goodwin
during Sir William Macgregor’s exploration of the Owen-Stanley Mountains in New Guinea. A female
specimen was originally procured by the late Carl Hunstein on the Horseshoe Ran
Mountains, and was named by Dr. Otto Finsch in honour of Dr. A. B.
Director of the Museum at Dresden, where he has got togethe

ge of the Owen-Stanley
Meyer, the well-known and energetic
ra series of the Paradisiide, which may some
day rival the great collections of Leyden and London.

In 1887 Dr. E. Pierson Ramsay described the male bird as Epinachus macleayane, and named it in
honour of Lady Macleay, the wife of Sir William Macleay, who has done so much to promote the study of
natural science in Australia. The orthography of the specific name should have been macleaye, as
Dr. Meyer has already pointed out. The specimen was said by Dr. Ramsay to have been procured at the
foot of the Astrolabe Mountains; and Dr. Meyer was at first inclined to believe that the birds procured by
Hunstein at a height of 7000 feet would prove to be distinct, and that Z. macleaye and E. meyeri were not
identical. Count Salvadori, on the other had, has expressed his opinion that the identity of the two birds
was probable, and J believe that Dr. Meyer is now also satisfied on this point. After comparing the
specimens in the British Museum with Dr. Ramsay’s description, I have no doubt that we have bis species
before us, and that there is only one form of Great Epimachus in South-eastern New Guinea. There
must have been some mistake about the locality of Dr. Ramsay’s specimen, as the species inhabits only
very high altitudes.

Mr. Goodwin, who accompanied Sir William Macgregor’s expedition to Mount Owen Stanley, has given
me the following notes :—‘* One day, when we were on Mount Musgrave, at an altitude of 6000 feet, one of
our party brought in a Long-tailed Bird of Paradise, which we recognized as the Epimachus macleayane of
Ramsay. ‘The original specimen was discovered some two years previously by Belford, one of our party, in
the Maroko district. It inhabits the higher ranges at an altitude of from 6000 to 9000 feet, and is the
highest ranging species of Bird of Paradise that I know, as above that limit we met with no other species of
the family, though Bower-birds occurred. The call of Z. macleayane@ is a double note, similar to the sound
of striking two clappers together. I had many an unprofitable stalk before I was rewarded by a successful
shot at one of these birds, and only got specimens on the last day which we spent at these heights.”

Mr. Goodwin’s specimens, of which the best pair have been secured by Dr. Meyer for the Dresden
Museum, were all damaged by having their bills more or less broken; but Mr. Goodwin explained to me that
the bird inhabits rocky ground, so that, when shot, it falls with tremendous force down the ravines, the long
tail guiding it in its downward descent, and thus the slender bill invariably touches the ground first and is
broken by the shock.

The adult male may be described as very similar to L. speciosus, but differing in the colour of the mney
surface, which is dark drab-brown glossed with purple, the long filamentous plumes of the flanks bene;
mouse-brown instead of black ; the axillaries are very similar in the two species, but the long plumes which
clothe the flanks are differently coloured. The sickle-shaped side-plumes are arranged in four series, and
are not so developed in /. meyeri as they are in EL. speciosus. .

The anterior (pectoral) tuft is brown, barred at the end with bronzy lilac in LE. meyeri, and with coppery
green preceded by a subterminal line of deep blue.

The median tuft in Z. meyeri is black with a purplish metallic bar at the end, preceded by a subterminal
band of metallic steel-blue.

In E. speciosus the colouring is the same, but the plumes are much larger.

 

  
   
  
   
    
    
   
    
  
   
 
  
  
  
    
  
 
  
  
  
     
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  
 
 
  
 
 

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