Birds and Birding's Guide to:

Watching THE PLOVER-LIKE BIRDS

THE PRATINCOLES AND COURSERS

The Coursers,

comprising the second subfamily (Cursoriince),&Te distinguished by the absence of the hind toe and a relatively much longer tarsus, while the tail is nearly or quite even, and their food is not taken on the wing. As might be inferred from their common name, they are terrestrial and eminently”running”birds, frequenting mainly the dry, arid, sandy plains and deserts, over which they run with astonishing speed. In the typical Coursers (Cursorius) the bill is relatively long and curved, perhaps the best-known species being the Cream-colored Courser (C. gallicus) of the deserts of northern Africa, whence it ranges to the Canaries and Cape Verde Islands, and east to Afghanistan and northwest India, and occasionally wanders into continental Europe.

In coloration it is rufous-buff above and nearly white below, with the breast tinged with gray and the flanks with blackish, while the' wings are blackish, and the tail similar to the back, all the feathers except the middle pair with a subterminal black band and white tip, and there is a white band above each eye which meets behind the nape and is bordered below by a black stripe; the length is ten inches. This is usually a shy bird, escaping the intruder by running swiftly away or by squatting prone on the ground with which its colors so harmonize that it becomes exceedingly difficult to detect it.

This, and the other species as well, feeds on insects of various kinds and occasionally upon seeds. The two or sometimes three eggs are deposited on the bare sand. Three of the remaining species are confined to Africa, while the fourth, known as the Indian Courser (C. coromandelicus), occurs in the Indian peninsula and Ceylon. Passing over the Coursers of the genus Rhinoptilus with straight bills, of which there are seven in various parts of Africa and a single exceedingly rare one in India, we come to the so-called Black-backed Courser, or Crocodile Bird (Pluvianus (zgyptius), which is the sole representative of its genus. It differs from its allies, as already hinted, in having oval instead of slit-like nostrils, while in the interscapular region the plumes are elongated and overhang the lower back.

The general color is slaty brown above, the crown, hind neck, and mantle of a greenish black, the latter bordered with white as is the crown, while the lower parts are white with a broad pectoral band of black.

This bird, also known as the Black-headed Plover, inhabits West and Northeast Africa and is especially common on the banks of the Nile, where it may be seen feeding or running rapidly along the sandy bars or flying swiftly over the water, uttering its peculiar chattering note which resembles the words zic zac, which is the native name by which it is known.

It seems well authenticated that the eggs are buried in the moist sand where they are incubated by the intense heat of the sun. Should the sand over the eggs become dry, the birds have been observed to moisten it by first dipping the breast in the water and applying it to the sand. There are some differences of opinion as to whether this or Hoplopterus spinosus is the true Crocodile Bird, but the facts as at present understood seem to favor the latter.

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