SHORT CUTS BY BIRDS TO NECTARIES, 393 
3. In one area discriminative damage was seen, confined to flower-bases 
exposed by defects in the continuity of the flower-spheres. 
4, There was evidence, in the shape of great trouble taken to avoid it, that 
certain individual birds more than others disliked the natural opening. This 
was probably largely responsible for the “short cuts” taken by the more 
indiscriminate individuals. 
5. Hive-bees systematically utilized artificial openings, passing over the 
flowers in which they failed to find them. 
(x. OBSERVATIONS ON G REVILLEA. 
Grevillea robusta, A. Cunn., and Grevillea Banksii, R. Br., two flourishing 
importations from Australia, have been freely adopted by many of our local 
birds and each year ripen plenty of seed. My opportunities of observing 
the second-named species have not been so good as in the other case, but 
Т have at one time or another seen its flowers visited by the following sun- 
birds :— Chalcomitra kirki, Shelley, C. gutturalis (Linn.) Cab., Cinnyris chaly- 
bæus, Shelley, C. niassæ, Reichw., C. olivacina, Gadow, and Anthothreptes 
hypodilus, Gadow. To these my friends Dr. and Mrs. W. L. Thompson, 
who have shrubs of this species in front of their house near Chirinda, add the 
malachite sunbird, Nectarinia famosa (Linn.) Shelley, and bulbuls, Pycnonotus 
layardi, Gurney. 
The flowers of two large trees of G. robusta beside my house are con- 
tinually visited not only by some of the above species of sunbirds but by 
two bulbuls (Pycnonotus layardi, Gurney, and Phyllostrophus milanjensis, 
Shelley), an oriole (Oriolus larvatus, Licht.), and a forest-hunting weaver 
(Sycobrotus stictifrons, Fischer & Reichw.). At“ Wolverhampton” (a farm 
20 miles from Chirinda) on Oct. 27th, 1912, I watched for some time at 
Grevillea robusta flowers two species of migrant warblers—a garden warbler 
(Sylvia simpler, Lath.), and а willow-wren (Phylloscopus trochilus (Linn.) 
Boie) ; also Cinnyris niassw, Pycnonotus layardi, and Hyphantornis jamesoni, 
Sharpe. 
А Р. layardi that I shot after it had been busy for some time at my 
Grevillea robusta flowers at Chirinda had its forehead, lores, throat, and 
upper breast thickly besprinkled with pollen ; and these are the portions of 
their bodies which all the above birds, when I have watched them, appeared 
to rub against the upstanding pistils in reaching down to the honey. A 
‘aptive bulbul which I provided with racemes of this species became most 
freely dusted immediately round the bill—that is, on the forehead, lores, 
and upper throat—but he also sometimes obtained pollen on the breast, as 
the result of Jeaning well over to reach flowers at a distance. 
I have seen no honey-robbery by birds here, nor is there, I think, very 
much temptation or opportunity in relation to the birds I bave actually seen 
atthe flowers. The flowers generally are tougb, lean and wiry—there is 
