Larvivora cyana, _Gould, Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 145; _Hume, Rough Draft
N. & E._ no. 507.
I have never obtained the nest of the Indian Blue Chat. Mr. Davison
found it on the Nilghiris. He says:--"I really quite forget the
details of that one egg which I brought you along with the skin of the
parent, but it was taken in May on the Nilghiris. I remember very well
another nest of this species, which I took in the latter end of March
or the beginning of April in a shola or detached piece of jungle about
9 miles from Ootacamund.
"The nest was in a hole in the trunk of a small tree, about 5 feet
from the ground, and was composed chiefly of moss, but mixed with dry
leaves and twigs. It contained three young birds, apparently about
four or five days old."
The late Mr. Mandelli sent me a nest of this species which was found
at Lebong (elevation 5500 feet) on the 16th May. It contained three
eggs, and was placed on the ground amongst grass on a bank made by
the cutting of a hill-road. It is a broad shallow nest, composed
exteriorly of vegetable fibre, scraps of dead leaves and tiny pieces
of moss matted closely together, and is rather thickly lined with
black and red hairs, amongst which one or two soft downy feathers are
incorporated. The external diameter of the nest is about 4 inches, the
height about 1·5, the cavity is about 2·75 inches in diameter, and
rather less than 1 in depth.
Two eggs taken by Mr. Darling[A] are very elongated, somewhat
cylindrical ovals, very obtuse at both ends. In both, the shell is
fine, and has an appreciable though not brilliant gloss. In one, the
ground is a pale delicate clay-brown, and the markings consist only
of a zone about 0·2 wide round the large end of densely set dull
brownish-red specks, and a few similar specks inside the zone only.
In the other, the ground has a light greenish tinge, the zone is less
marked and merges in a dull brownish-red mottled cap, and a faint
marbling, of a paler shade of the cap, is scattered here and there
over the whole surface of the egg. They measure 1 by 0·65 and 0·98 by
0·65.
[Footnote A: I cannot find any account of the finding of the nest of
this bird by Mr. Darling amongst Mr. Hume's notes.--Ed.]
The egg taken by Mr. Davison is an elongated, slightly pyriform oval.
The shell is moderately fine, but with only a very slight gloss. The
ground-colour is a pale slightly greyish green, and the whole egg is
thickly (most thickly so about the large end, where the markings are
almost perfectly confluent) mottled and streaked with pale brownish
red. It measures 0·98 by 0·67.
193. Brachypteryx albiventris (Fairbank). _The White-bellied_
_Short-wing_.
Callene albiventris, _Fairb., Hume, Rough Draft N. & E._ no. 339 bis.
The Rev. S.B. Fairbank, to whom I have, owed much useful information
and many valuable specimens, kindly sent me the subjoined account of
the nidification of the White-bellied Short-wing in the Pulney Hills
at an elevation of about 6500 feet:--"In April, I found a nest in a
hole in the side of the trunk of a large tree some 2 feet from the
ground. The hole was just large enough for the nest, and was lined
with fine roots. I surprised the bird on her nest several times. There
were two eggs in the nest when I first found it that were 'hard-set'.
A month afterwards she laid two more in the same place, and I took
them in good condition. One egg measures 0·9 by 0·68 inch, and another
0·94 by 0·68 inch. The ground-colour is grey, with a tinge of green,
and it is thickly covered with small spots of bistre."
Mr. Blanford, who saw the eggs, which I never did, describes them
(and by analogy, I should infer more correctly) as "of an olive-brown
colour, darker at the larger end, measuring 0·93 by 0·63 inch."
An egg of this species sent me by Dr. Fairbank, measuring 0·93 by
0·66, is a somewhat elongated oval, slightly pointed towards the small
end. The shell is fine and fairly glossy; the ground-colour, so far as
this is discernible, is greyish green, but it is so thickly clouded
and mottled all over with a warm, brown, that but little of the
ground-colour is any where traceable, and the general result when the
egg is looked at from a short distance is that of a nearly uniform
olive-brown.
Captain Horace Terry also found the nest of this bird on the Pulney
Hills. He says:--"I met with it a few times in the big _shola_ at
Kodikanal, and got two nests, each with two fresh eggs; the first on
the 7th June in a hole in a tree between 4 and 5 feet from the ground,
a deep cup of green moss; the other, in a hole in the bank of a
path running through the _shola_ was of green moss and a few fine
fern-roots. Inside 1·75 inch deep and 2·5 inches across; outside a
shapeless mass of moss filling up the hole it was built in. The nest
was very conspicuous to any one passing by."
194. Brachypteryx rufiventris (Blyth). _The Rufous-bellied
Short-wing_.
Callene rufiventris, _Blyth. Jerd. B. Ind._ i, p. 496: _Hume, Rough
Draft N. & E._ no. 339.
I have been favoured with nests of the Rufous-bellied Short-wing by
Mr. Carter, who took them from holes or depressions of banks in the
Nilghiris in April and May. They closely resemble nests of _Niltava
macrigoriae_ from Darjeeling. They are soft masses of green moss,
some 4 or 5 inches in diameter externally, with more or less of a
depression towards one side, lined with very fine dark moss-roots.
This depression may average about 2½ inches across and ¾ inch in
depth; but they vary a good deal. Mr. Carter says:--"I have found the
nests of this species about Conoor in May, in holes of banks, on
roads running through thick _sholas_ (i.e. jungles not amounting to
forests). The nests are of moss, shallow, lined with fine root-fibres,
the cavity about 3-5 inches in diameter. They lay two eggs, pale
olive, shading into a decided brownish red at the larger end. The old
birds are very shy in returning to the nest when watched; indeed, they
are always shy, hiding in the brushwood of jungles or amongst fallen
timber, along which they almost creep."
Mr. Davison informs me that "this species breeds on the Nilghiris from
about 5500 feet to about 7000 during April and May, building in holes
of trees, crevices of rocks, &c., seldom at any great elevation
above the ground. The nest is composed of moss, lined with moss and
fern-roots. Two or three eggs are laid."
The few eggs I possess, which I owe to Messrs. Carter and Davison, and
which were taken by them in the Nilghiris, have a pale olive-brown
ground with, at the large end, an ill-defined mottled reddish-brown
cap. In some specimens the mottling extends more or less over the
whole egg, though always most dense about the larger end. Though much
larger and of a more elongated shape, they not a little resemble some
specimens of the eggs of _Pratincola indica_ that I possess. In shape
they are long ovals, recalling in that respect those of _Myiophoneus
temmincki_; they have less gloss than the eggs of most of the
Thrushes.
In length they vary from 0·97 to 1·02 inch, and in breadth from 0·65
to 0·69 inch.