Falco ernesti Sharpe, Ibis (1894), 545; Hand-List (1899), 1, 273;
Grant, Ibis (1895), 438; (1896), 530; McGregor and Worcester,
Hand-List (1906), 44.
Falco atriceps Clarke, Ibis (1895), 476.
Luzon (Heriot, Whitehead); Negros (Keay, Whitehead); Sibuyan
(McGregor [25]); Siquijor (Celestino). New Guinea; Greater Sunda
and Fiji Islands.
Diagnosis.--Similar to Falco melanogenys but blacker; beneath
everywhere shaded with ashy gray; wing-lining and axillars black,
crossed with narrow white bars. Length, 394 mm.; wing, 295; tail,
140; tarsus, 48. [26]
"The adult male [collected by Hose at 1,400 meters on Mount Dulit,
Borneo] is a remarkably beautiful specimen, and is evidently of the
same race of peregrine as Mr. Pretyman's bird from the Lawas River,
but is not quite so red on the chest. The closeness of the barring of
the under wing-coverts and axillars is remarkable and gives the species
a much blacker look than F. melanogenys while no specimen of the last
name falcon in the [British] Museum has the under tail-coverts and
thighs bluish gray like the sides of the body. Whether Falco ernesti
(as I have named the bird, after Mr. Ernest Hose) is confined to
Borneo I can not yet tell, but I think that it is very likely to be
found to be the resident form of all the Indo-Malayan Islands, as a
specimen procured by Mr. Maitland-Heriot in Manila seems certainly
referable to it." (Sharpe.)
Grant says: "In adults of F. ernesti, though the breast is occasionally
washed with fulvous, the sides, flanks, and belly are dark slate-gray
or bluish gray, and the whole of the under surface below the crop is
thickly covered with rather wide, close-set black bars, giving these
parts a very dark appearance."