Smith. — On tJie Ncating Habits of Ehipidura flabellifera. 3. 



out in pursuit of their prey as it hove ui sight. These graceful little birds 

 possess remarkably quick and clear vision, while their minute and delicate 

 beaks may occasionally be distinctly heard snapping at their prey as they 

 flit near the observer. 



When at Tirotiro-moana Valley, in Taranaki, on the 7th August, 1905, 

 I observed a pair of fantails constructing a nest on a Hmb of tutu-shrub 

 partly overhanging the road formed obliquely along the steep east side of 

 the valley. They were using mosses and lichens chiefly, and, as with the 

 pair studied by Mr. Douglas Park, the male was carrying the materials, 

 while the female wove them expertly and neatly into the nest. For about 

 two minutes during the half-hour I watched them the male assisted in 

 placing and fixing the materials it brought into the structure. They were 

 working with great vivacity and vigour, meanwhile twittering freely to each 

 other. The female seemed to work fretfully, but with perfect precision, and 

 was a little fastidious in the selection of the materials brought by her mate 

 wherewdth to build the nest. They were working with great activity when 

 I reluctantly left them. 



When engaged preparing these notes I received an interesting letter 

 from Mr. D. Sinclair, C.E., of Terrace End, Palmerston North, narrating 

 a remarkable experience mth a fantail's nest, which I have pleasure in 

 reproducing here. 



" While I was engineer for the Pohangina County Council," writes Mr. 

 Sinclair, " I was using a slasher cutting a line through the bush. In doing 

 so I cut a small branch of a rather bushy tawhara, which often grows on 

 the side of a tree-fern. The branch fell from the slasher upside down, when 

 I noticed a fantail's nest, and, to my surprise, found that the bird was on 

 the nest, and, although it was upside down, the bird was clinging so ten- 

 aciously to the nest that it prevented the Httle eggs (four in number) from 

 falling out. The little bird sat on the nest with its eyes closed, and seemed 

 oblivious to the rough ordeal it was being subjected to. I lifted it partly off 

 the nest to count the number of eggs, when it hustled itself down again in 

 the nest, saying in efl'ect, if not in words, without sound or motion, ' Do 

 what you will with me, I am going to stick to my nest.' Maternity seemed 

 for the moment to outweigh all sense of danger in the little fantail. I 

 carried it a little distance in the bush from where the line was being cut. 

 and inserted the branch in an upright position in the trunk of another fern- 

 tree, with the hope that the fearless little mother would be rewarded in 

 due time with four little fantails." 



To Mr. Park, jun., is due the honour of first observing and ascertaining 

 precisely the respective time-periods of nest-bmlding, egg-laying, and hatch- 

 ing of the native fantail fly-catcher, which constitutes a valuable addition 

 to our knowledge of the habits of the species. Though these birds are still 

 fairly numerous, there is some probability of them becoming rarer as the 

 native bush disappears. In parts of the South Island they adapt them- 

 selves to wholly altered conditions to those of the native bush during the 

 winter months. On the approach of cold weather in the bush remaining 

 in some of the valleys of the fore hills of other ranges in Canterbury the 

 fantails migrate across the plains and live in the plantations and shubberies 

 around the settlers' homes, until the nesting instinct returns with the warmth 

 of spring, when they again repair to the bush to nest for the season. 



The nest of the native fantail ranks amongst the neatest and best-finished 

 of its class, and is an excellent model of bird-architecture. A closer exam- 

 ination of the methods of lacing together the soft mosses, lichens, tiny leaves. 



