The Natural History of Ireland/Volume 1/White’s Thrush

WHITE'S THRUSH.

Turdus Whitei, Eyton.

Has once occurred in Ireland,

As noticed by Mr. G. J. Allman (now Professor of Botany in Trinity College, Dublin,) in the 11th vol. of the Annals of Natural History, p. 78. The communication is dated Dec, 15th, 1842, and states that the writer is in possession of a specimen of this very rare bird, obtained about ten days previously in the neighbourhood of Bandon, county of Cork. It is said in the Pauna of Cork, that the gentleman at whose place the bird was obtained, saw what he believed to be another of the same species there ; but when, is not mentioned.

Two specimens, at most, of T. Whitei have been obtained in Great Britain, and both in Hampshire. The one which has served for the descriptions and figures of the species was shot by Lord Malmesbury in January, 1828. The Irish specimen is similar to it. The following notes upon this bird were made in Dublin in September, 1845, when a comparison was also drawn up between it and a thrush from Nepal, so far as the imperfect specimens would admit : — the Irish bird wants the head and neck j the Nepal one, the legs. The latter specimen was presented by Mr. Hodgson to the museum of Trinity College, Dublin, under the name of Oreocincla Whitei, and noted as a duplicate of one (and numbered 194), which he had presented to the British Museum collection.

[Gives wing feather measurements for Irish specimen and Nepal specimen Rmaking Fourth quill This trivial difference is exceeded by one half in the other wing of the same specimen. In the one wing, the third and fourth quills are of equal length ; in the other, the fourth exceeds the third by one-twelfth of an inch. ] see

The tail of the Irish bird in length and size generally, exceeds that of the Nepal one, as much proportionally as the wing. In colouring and marking the two birds are similar, — agreeing with the descriptions and figures of Eyton and Yarrell, — with the unimportant difference of the Irish one being the deeper in tint, owing, it may be presumed, either to its being killed sooner after moult, or being less exposed to the sun and weather than the Nepal bird. The mere disagreement in size between them is not, I consider, of any specific consequence -, but the discrepancy in the relative length of the quill feathers to each other may be so considered, should it prove to be a permanent character.