506 



ON THE PLUMAGE OF ADULT MALES OF THE GENUS MALURUS, 



parks and gardens about Sydney. At Dobroyde I have also noted 

 them during May, June, July and August. On the 2nd of August 

 I met with a pair of M. cyaneus in Dobroyde garden ; they were 

 very tame and allowed me to approach within a few feet of them ; 

 the male was a most brilliantly plumaged bird, and fully excelled, 

 if not exceeded, any I have seen during spring and summer ; Mr. 

 James Ramsay who was present at the time informed me that the 

 pail- in question were bred in the garden about the end of 1889 

 and had remained ever since, and that at the end of March when 

 they were about three months old, and before the male had com- 

 menced to assume his distinguishing plumage, they constructed a 

 nest in the bushy end of a drooping branch of a pine tree (Arau- 

 caria cunninglmmi) gi'owing in the garden ; this was unfortunately 

 discovered by a Narrow-billed Bronze Cuckoo ( Lamprococcyx 

 hasalis) which deposited an egg in it, which was hatched by the 

 Malurus upon whom devolved the rearing of the intruder and sole 

 occupant of the nest.* I saw the young male 2Icdurus referred 

 to on the 21st of June; it had then just attained its fully adult 

 plumage. 



The young males of M. cyaneus are similar to the females until 

 they are between three and four months old, when they commence 

 to develop their distinguishing plumage, and assume their full 

 adult livery at the end of six months. 



About Dobroyde this winter I have met with M. cyaneus, in 

 pairs ; this is exceptional, as in the Botanic Gardens and elsewhere 

 I have mostly observed them in small companies from five to seven 

 in number, flitting from bush to bush, or tripping about on the 

 grass. Some of these companies exhibit the different stages of 

 plumage assumed by the male of this species, viz., juvenile, semi- 

 adult, and fully adult ; others exhibit only the dull coloured 

 plumage of the female, the latter probably the last brood of the 

 season, for these birds breed till late in the autumn. One may, 

 however, see probably four or five birds in the brown plumage of 

 the female, or the mixed brown, blue and black, of the semi-adult, 



• This pair again started to build ou the 16th of August on the site of 

 their old nest in the pine tree. 



