“An extremely active bird, running up and down the trunks and branches
of the trees with the utmost rapidity, always in families of from ten to
twenty in number. It utters a weak piping note while on the wing, and
occasionally while running up and down the trees. Its flight, which is
generally performed in rather rapid undulating starts, is of short
duration.”
In a letter lately received from Mr. Gilbert he informs me, on the
authority of Mr. Johnson Drummond, that this species “makes a nest of
short strips of bark attached together and fastened to the branch with
cobwebs, and so covered over with them as to be very nearly smooth; the
cobweb is laid or felted on, not wound round the pieces; portions of
lichen are frequently attached. The nest is generally placed in the
highest and most slender fork of an Acacia, and is most difficult to
detect, from its very diminutive size and from its resembling a slight
excrescence of the wood; the eggs are three in number, of a whitish
colour, with circular green spots regularly distributed over the whole
surface. The bird breeds in September, and Mr. Johnson Drummond states
that the margin of the nest is brought to a sharp edge like that of
_Piezorhynchus nitidus_. Would you not have supposed that this bird
breeds in the holes of trees like the Nuthatch of Europe?”
On reference to the synonyms given above, it will be seen, that prior to
my visit to Australia, I regarded, described and named the two sexes of
this bird as distinct species, an error which the opportunity I
subsequently had of observing the bird in a state of nature and of
dissecting recent specimens has enabled me to correct; the black-headed
specimens proving to be females, and those with a black cap only males.
The male has the forehead, stripe over the eye, throat, breast, and
centre of the abdomen white; crown of the head black; ear-coverts, back
of the neck and back greyish brown, with a small stripe of dark brown
down the centre of each feather of the latter; rump white; upper and
under tail-coverts greyish brown, crossed with an arrow-shaped mark of
dark brown, and tipped with white; tail black, the centre feathers
slightly and the outer ones largely tipped with white; wings blackish
brown, with a large patch of rufous in the centre, interrupted by the
blackish brown margins of some of the secondaries; all the feathers
slightly tipped with greyish brown; flanks and vent greyish brown; bill
yellow at the base, black at the tip; feet beautiful king’s-yellow;
irides buffy hazel; eyelash buff.
The female differs in being somewhat darker on the upper surface, and in
having the whole of the upper part of the head including the orbits deep
black.
The figures represent both sexes of the natural size.
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