MILVUS AFFINIS, Gouwaa.
Allied Kite.

Milvus affnis, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., Part V. p. 140; and in Syn. Birds of Australia, Part III.
E-le-nid-jul, Aborigines of Port Essington.

 

Wiru the single exception of Van Diemen’s Land, this Kite is universally dispersed over all the Australian
Colonies, and is equally as common at Port Kssington, on the north coast, as it is on the southern por-
tions of the country.

Its confident and intrepid disposition renders it familiar to every one, and not unfrequently costs it its
life, as it fearlessly enters the farm-yard of the settler, and if unopposed, impudently deals out destruction to
the young poultry, pigeons, &c. tenanting it. It is also a constant attendant at the camps of the Aborigines
and the hunting parties of the settlers, perching on the small trees immediately surrounding them, and
patiently waiting for the refuse or offal. The temerity of one individual was such, that it even disputed my
right to a Bronze-winged Pigeon that had fallen before my gun, for which act, I am now almost ashamed to
say, it paid the penalty of its life; on reflection I asked myself why should advantage have been taken of the
confident disposition implanted in the bird by its Maker, particularly too when it was in a part of the country
where no white man had taken up his abode and assumed a sovereign right over all that surrounds him.

The flight of this bird, which is closely allied in character to that of the M/ous ater of Europe, is much
less protracted and soaring than that of the typical Kites; the bird is also much more arboreal in its habits,
skulking about the forest after the manner of the true Buzzards. Great numbers have been observed
hovering over the smoke of the extensive fires so common in Australia, closely watching for Lizards and
any of the smaller mammalia that may have fallen victims to the flames, or have been driven by the heat
from their lurking places.

In the southern parts of Australia this bird is a stationary species; I did not, however, succeed in
procuring its eggs, or any account of its nidification.

The sexes are so nearly alike that the single figure in the accompanying Plate will serve for a representa-
tion of both.

Feathers of the head, and the back and sides of the neck reddish fawn colour, with a central stripe of
dark blackish brown; all the upper surface glossy brown inclining to chocolate, and passing into reddish
brown on the wing-coverts, the shaft of each feather being black, and the extreme tip pale poe primaries
black; secondaries blackish brown ; tail, which is slightly forked, brown, ee by Se bars
of a darker tint, and each feather tipped with greyish white ; throat brownish fawn colour, with the stem of
each feather black; the remainder of the under surface rufous brown, with a central line of dark brown on
each feather, which is broadest and most conspicuous on the clests cere, gape and base of the lower man-
dible yellow ; upper mandible and point of the lower black; tarsi and toes yellow ; claws black ; irides very
dark brown.

The figure is about two-thirds of the natural size.

 

 

 

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