2 > ^OVITATES ZOOLOGICAE XXV. 1918. 



nothing frightens them, is not until two or three days after liatching — they 

 follow the old ones so closely, and caU so persistently and plaintively if left 

 only a short distance behind, that no special colour pattern appears necessary 

 to enable the old birds to keep in touch with them. Possibly it is an assistance 

 if a fright should cause a family to scatter and hide, I mean when they wish 

 to get together again, yet my observations show that it is the voice which is 

 depended upon, both parents and chicks caDing continuously untU all are 

 assembled. It is noteworthy that despite its seemingly conspicuous colouring a 

 Moorhen chick is exceedingly difficult to find when it crouches among reeds and 

 rushes or other herbage, and especially so in the dark recesses of the bank of 

 a pond or stream. 



For at least the first week, and probably longer, the old birds catch insects, 

 etc., for their fa.r.ily, and carefully feed them. After this the chicks will pick 

 up food but depend on the adults to find it for them until they are three weeks 

 or somewhat older. During this period a gradual but not very noticeable 

 change takes place in the colouring of the head, shield, and biU. The yellow 

 tip assumes a more greenish tinge, a dark Hue appears dividing this part from 

 the scarlet upper portion, and the red itself loses that wax-like transparencj' 

 which was so beautiful. The skin of the forehead also becomes more opaque, 

 the blue areas are now grey, and the pinky-yellow skin of the skull also has a 

 greyish tuige, in short, the whole scheme loses its freshness and brUliancy. 

 After this the alteration proceeds more conspicuously and rapidly. In the 

 case of two birds that I reared by hand a spot of dark pigment appeared on 

 the shield when they were thuty days old. This grew bigger and spread down 

 the centre and sides of the upper mandible, so that when it reached ^^•hat was 

 formerly the dark line round the bUl, but which had now become a broad band, 

 the last vestiges of colour were left as two isolated spots of faded pink above 

 each nostril. The dark band had at the same time spread towards the tip so 

 as to also obscure even the yellow area. The complete disappearance of all 

 colour coincided with the growth of feathers, so that by the time my surviving 

 Moorhen (the other met with an untimely accident) was fuUy feathered, its 

 beak and shield were quite in keeping with its dull grejnsh-green hues. 



During the autumn the young Moorhen loses the drab plumage of im- 

 maturity, and assumes the smart livery of the adult, but in the date of regaining 

 the scarlet shield my observations lead n.e to believe there is considerable varia- 

 tion. A bird that I watched during the winter 1916-17, and which, judging 

 by its large size, I believed to be a male, did not acquire the full colouring until 

 the end of February 1917, though a fading of the dark pigment, and a brownish 

 look about the bill, foretold the change in January. Another young Moorhen 

 which I kept under observation durmg the pa.st sunnner and autumn (1917) 

 was indistinguishable from the adults by the end of October. This bird, which 

 from its small size must, I think, have been a female, was hatched on July 1st, 

 much later than the bird of the previous year which did not regain its crimson 

 until February, yet she showed signs of the change at the beguming of the 

 October of the year in which she was bred, and, as I have already said, had 

 assumed the full adult colouring and plumage by the end of the month. Possibly 

 cold weather has a retarding cftict, and the cxceistionally severe winter of 1916-17 

 may account for the Moorhen watched in that year being so long in assuming 

 the bright colouring. Once acquired, or rather, reacquired, the scarlet of bill 



