Talk:Jerdon's courser

Original description

Above sandy brown with a faint pink gloss, the dorsal feathers slightly margined with rusty brown, and the wing-coverts more conspicuously with pale rufescent ; crown of the head black with rusty lateral margins to the feathers ; a broad white supercilium, commencing with the lores, is continued round the occiput, and there is a less defined (but equally conspicuous) rufescent white streak along the mesial line of the head ; ear-coverts streaked dusky and ferruginous ; throat white, with a broad rufous band below it ; this is bordered by a narrow white semi-collar, continued to below the ear-coverts and narrowly edged above and below with dusky, then follows a broad brown gorget, and another white collar, margined above and below with dusky ; this again is succeeded by brown, forming an ill-defined band on the lower part of the breast, and the rest of the lower parts are isabelline, with white upper and lower tail -coverts ; primaries and their coverts black, the first two primaries largely and obliquely marked with white, which is reduced to a large sub-terminal spot on the inner web of the third primary, and a small analogous spot on the fourth; tail white at base, extending for two-thirds of the length of the exterior web of its outermost feather ; the terminal half of the tail black, passing basally into brown, and all but the middle feathers having a small white spot at the extremity of their inner webs.

�Bill yellow at the base, horny at the tip ; irides dark brown ; legs pale fleshy yellow. Length 9.5 to 10 inches; wing 6.75; tail 3; tarsus 2 5/8 ; middle toe with nail not 1 ; outer toe barely 1/2 ; bill at front 3/4.

This remarkable Plover has hitherto, I believe, only been procured by myself, from the hilly country above the Eastern Ghats, off Nellore, and in Cuddapah. It frequents rocky and undulating ground with thin forest jungle, and is found in small parties, not very noisy, but occasionally uttering a plaintive cry. I believe it to be a permanent resident. It is an almost unique instance of a species of Plover having such an extremely limited geographical distribution ; and I imagine that hereafter it will be found spread through many parts of the Balaghat district and Mysore. Blyth writes me that Hemerodromus cinctus, recently figured in the Ibis, vol. v., is certainly of the same genus as this bird. It appears to be the young of one of the other African species.

— Jerdon

The original description can be useful on occassion and is in Public domain. Shyamal (talk) 15:04, 21 November 2008 (UTC)