Notes on Paradise flycatchers in Malaysia. F.N. Chasen and C.B. Kloss. Records of the Raffles Museum, No. 32
This short note by F.N. Chasen and C.B. Kloss addresses the taxonomic separation of the migratory Terpsiphone paradisi incei from the resident T. p. affinis in the Malay Peninsula and Sumatra, with a broader overview of T. paradisi subspecies (pp. 66–68).
Summary
The authors demonstrate that adult black-and-white males of incei and affinis cannot be reliably separated by colour alone, but that size measurements (wing, first primary, bill length) provide a useful criterion. They present two size groups from the Malay Peninsula: eleven specimens with wings 88–92 mm, first primary 12–15 mm, and bill 12–13 mm, allocated to incei; and fourteen with wings 93–98 mm, first primary 15.5–19 mm, and bill 14–16 mm, allocated to affinis. They note that affinis bills are also broader and more flattened (p. 66). Short-tailed brown-backed individuals are more difficult to allocate, particularly immatures, but those combining smaller bills, shorter wings, and dark (non-glossy) throats with an obvious margination are assigned to incei (p. 67).
The note then provides a taxonomic framework dividing T. paradisi into two sections: one in which brown-backed birds assume a glossy black foreneck (including turkestanica, leucogaster, paradisi, ceylonensis, nicobarica, and incei), and one in which they do not (including affinis, borneensis, procera, insularis, and a Java form). The authors argue these sections do not warrant specific rank, as the distinction is essentially a matter of throat colouration in the brown phase (p. 67). The lesser Sunda Island forms floris and sumbaensis are discussed briefly, the latter being placed in the paradisi section on account of its glossy black throat (p. 68).
The first two pages of the document (pp. 65–66) constitute the tail end of a separate fish report on Gobiidae and Eleotridae from the Mentawi Islands (Siberut and Sipora), noting the variability of fin counts in Periophthalmus koelreuteri and the apparent absence of other common gobioid shore fishes (p. 65).