A Manual of Philippine Birds

by Richard C. McGregor

“Adult female in breeding plumage.—General color of the upper parts dull brown; forehead and eye-stripe buffish white, much narrower than in the male; lores and upper part of the ear-coverts brown; wings and wing-coverts not so dark as in the male; rump and upper tail-coverts white; tail as in the male, but the dark parts not quite so dark; under parts as in the male. After the autumn molt both sexes have a buffish brown margin to every feather, so that they are scarcely distinguishable, and resemble the adult female in breeding plumage except that the quills and tail-feathers are margined with buffish brown at the tip, and the innermost secondaries and wing-coverts are similarly margined, not only at the tip but along the outside webs; the under parts are also darker in color. It is not known that birds of the year differ from adults.

“Young in first plumage resemble the female, but have obscure transverse terminal dark bars and pale centers to most of the feathers of the upper and under parts.” (Seebohm.)

The only specimen of the wheatear recorded from the Philippines, a male from Calayan, measures: Wing, 97; tail, 57; culmen from base, 15; bill from nostril, 10; tarsus, 27.

Family SYLVIIDÆ.

Bill slender, short or moderately long; upper mandible with a small notch; culmen slightly curved near the tip; nostrils exposed; rictal bristles usually inconspicuous; wing rounded and curved to the body, tertials much shorter than secondaries; tarsus slender, longer than bill from gape; tail rounded, wedge-shaped, or graduate. Nearly all the members of this family are plainly colored and the sexes closely resemble each other. The young birds are unspotted; they either resemble the adults, or else they are more highly colored. Some of the genera of flycatchers are very similar to certain genera which are here placed in the Sylviidæ.

Characteristic species of the Turdidæ, Muscicapidæ, and Sylviidæ are easily recognized and distinguished, but the three families intergrade through intermediate genera so that even the highest authorities on classification are by no means agreed as to the respective limits of these three families.

Genera.

• a¹. Tail with twelve rectrices.
  • b¹. Tail wedge-shaped, or at least decidedly rounded, the rectrices usually pointed.
    • c¹. Wing longer than tail.
      • d¹. First primary shorter than primary-coverts and more or less pointed.
      • d². First primary longer than primary-coverts, equal to one-half the second primary or more.
    • • d¹. Rictal bristles minute; tail rounded Tribura (p. [571])
      • d². Rictal bristles moderate, the longest more than one-half the bill from nostril; rectrices strongly graduated Megalurus (p. [582])
    • c². Wing shorter than tail.
  • b². Tail square; the rectrices not pointed; first primary about equal to primary-coverts; third and fourth primaries equal and longest; rictal bristles moderate Acanthopneuste (p. [584])
• a². Tail with ten rectrices; rictal bristles well developed; first primary more than one-half the second; tail rounded or slightly graduate.
  • b¹. Front of tarsus scutellate; feathers of forehead and chin with their shafts stiff and extending beyond the webs Horornis (p. [586])
  • b². Front of tarsus entire; feathers of forehead and chin normal. Phyllergates (p. [588])

Genus LOCUSTELLA Kaup, 1829.

Bill small and slender; rictal bristles minute; wing flat and pointed, somewhat longer than tail; first primary narrow and pointed, less than primary-coverts; second primary nearly as long as third which is longest; rectrices graduated and slightly pointed, the outermost feather nearly as short as, or shorter than, under tail-coverts; tarsus and toes well developed, reaching nearly to tip of tail. Plumage obscure, spotted in the smallest species.