The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1 — David Hume — John Shaqi
The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds, Volume 1
David Hume · en
14. Cissa chinensis (Bodd.). _The Green Magpie_.
Cissa sinensis (_Briss._), _Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 312.
Cissa speciosa (_Shaw_), _Hume, Rough Draft N. & E._ no. 673.
According to Mr. Hodgson's notes the Green Magpie breeds in Nepal in
the lower valleys and in the Terai from April to July. The nest is
built in clumps of bamboos and is large and cup-shaped, composed of
sticks and leaves, coated externally with bamboo-leaves and vegetable
fibres, and lined inside with fine roots. It lays four eggs, one of
which is figured as a broad oval, a good deal pointed towards one end,
with a pale stone-coloured ground freckled and mottled all over with
sepia-brown, and measuring 1·27 by 0·89.
Mr. Oates writes:--"In the Pegu Hills on the 19th April I found the
nest of the Green Magpie, and shot the female off it.
"The nest was placed in a small tree, about 20 feet from the ground,
in a nullah and well exposed to view. The nest was neatly built,
exteriorly of leaves and coarse roots, and finished off interiorly
with finer fibres and roots; depth about 2 inches; inside diameter 6
inches. Contained three eggs nearly hatched; all got broken; I have
the fragments of one. The ground-colour is greenish white, much
spotted and freckled with pale yellowish-brown spots and dashes, more
so at the larger end than elsewhere."
Sundry fragments that reached me, kindly sent to me by Mr. Oates, had
a dull white ground, very thickly freckled and mottled all over, as
far as I could judge, with dull, pale, yellowish brown and purplish
grey, the former preponderating greatly. As to size and shape, this
deponent sayeth nought.
Major Bingham writes from Tenasserim:--"On the 18th April I found a
nest of this most lovely bird placed at a height of 5 feet from the
ground in the fork of a bamboo-bush. It was a broad, massive, and
rather shallow cup of twigs, roots, and bamboo-leaves outside, and
lined with finer roots. It contained three eggs of a pale greenish
stone-colour, thickly and very minutely speckled with brown, which
tend to coalesce and form a cap at the larger end. I shot the female
as she flew off the nest."
Major Bingham subsequently found another nest in Tenasserim, about
which he says:--
"Crossing the Wananatchoung, a little tributary of the Thoungyeen, by
the highroad leading from Meeawuddy to the sources of the Thoungyeen,
I found in a small thorny tree on the 8th April a nest of the above
bird--a great, firmly-built but shallow saucer of twigs, 6 feet or so
above the ground, and lined with fine black roots. It contained three
fresh eggs of a dingy greyish white, thickly speckled chiefly at the
large end, where it forms a cap, with light purplish brown. The eggs
measure 1·25 x 0·89, 1·18 x 0·92, and 1·20 x 0·90."