CLADORHYNCHUS PECTORALIS, @ Re. Gray.

Banded Stilt.

Leptorhynchus pectoralis, Dubus, in Mem. Roy. Acad. Bruss. Aug. 1835.—Guérin, Mag. Zool. 1836, Pl. XLV.
Himantopus palmatus, Gould, Syn. Birds of Australia, Part II.
Cladorhynchus pectoralis, G. R. Gray, List of Gen. of Birds, p. 69.

 

Styce the publication of the Second Part of my “Synopsis of the Birds of Australia,” in which I gave a
description and part figure of this species under the name of Himantopus palmatus, 1 have discovered that
the bird had been previously characterized as Leptorhynchus pectoralis by the Chevalier B. Dubus, in a
memoir presented to the Royal Academy of Brussels on the 17th of January, 1835. But the generic term
Leptorhynchus having been already employed in Ornithology, both his name and my own must give place to
that of Cladorhynchus, proposed in its stead by Mr. G. R. Gray in his recently published ‘“ Genera of Birds.”

During the time that has elapsed since the appearance of my description of this bird, I have had an
opportunity, through the kindness of Mr. Leadbeater, of examining two other examples, one of which was
destitute of the pectoral band that forms so conspicuous a mark on the breast of the one figured in the
accompanying Plate ; whether this mark is merely assumed during summer, or is distinctive of the sexes, I
regret to say, that not even my visit to Australia has enabled me satisfactorily to determine, never having
had the good fortune to meet with it in a state of nature. The Banded Stilt is an inhabitant of the
southern and western coast of Australia, where it lives much after the manner of, and frequently associates
with, the Australian Avocet (Recurwrostra rubricollis). While at Adelaide I saw a specimen that had been
shot in that neighbourhood ; and Mr. John Gilbert, in his Notes from Western Australia, states that it is
confined to Rottnest Island, that is to say, he saw it in no other part of the colony.

Body white; breast crossed by a broad band of chestnut, bordered anteriorly with black ; wings and
centre of the abdomen black ; bill black; legs reddish yellow. In a specimen, which I presume may be a
female, the band on the chest was greyish brown instead of chestnut, and there was no appearance of the
black mark on the centre of the abdomen; and in another the pectoral band was apparently disappearing,
from which I infer that this mark only exists during the breeding-season.

The Plate represents the bird of the natural size.