208 



NECTARINIID.B. 



shape. A typical nest that I saw being built was destroyed by a cat, or some animal just after 

 the eggs were laid. The long nest was built in a narrow passage-way connecting the house 

 with the kitchen. A wire hook suspended from one of the side beams supporting the roof of 

 this landing, had previously been used for a fern basket, which 

 was removed, and then the bird built there. The female used 

 to sit steadily, although people were constantly passing to and 

 fro. The female seems to do all the work, builds the nest, 

 does all the sitting, and feeds the young. I have never seen 

 the male do anything except hang on to the nest sometimes 

 while it is being built, when he chatters awaj' and seems to 

 be criticizing her work. Several times when I have taken 

 hold of a Sun-bird's nest to look in, the hen has always flown 

 out and called her mate, who immediately appears, so he is 

 evidently not far away trom the nest. The short nest was 

 suspended from a leaf of a small Tamarind Tree alongside a 

 verandah, and about five feet from the ground. Soon after 

 the eggs were laid I found the nest on the ground." lioth 

 nests are spindle-shaped in form and are built externally of 

 similar material; shreds of bark, bark and cocoa-nut fibre, 

 portions of dead leaves, plant down, spider webs and a quantity 

 of wood-borings made by the larva; of a moth, the inside being 

 lined with a mixture of plant-down and fowl's feathers. The 

 short nest has only a small quantity of nesting material above 

 the domed portion of the nest, and measures over all eight 

 inches in length. The long nest here figured, it will be seen, 

 has a quantity below as well as above the nest proper, and 

 measures eighteen inches in total length, by three inches in 

 diameter at its widest part. 





XKST OF SIIN-ISIRD. 



Immature males resemble the adult female but are of a 

 duller yellow on the under surface, and there is a line of 

 metallic purplish-blue feathers from the chin down the centre 

 of the throat and foreneck. The wing-measurement of a 

 specimen in the Australian Museum collection in this stage of 

 plumage is 2-15 inches, which nearly equals that of the adult. 



September to the middle of I-'ebruary constitutes the 

 normal breeding season of the Sun-bird, but, as will be seen 

 from Mr. Boyd's notes, nests may be found in almost any 

 month, one pair of birds that he had breeding under his 

 verandah rearing four broods from August, i8g6, to August, 

 1897. 



This species is one of the foster parents of the Bronze 

 Cuckoo. One set of eggs taken by Mr. Boyd and forwarded 

 to me, contained one Sun-bird's egg and one egg of the Bronze 

 Cuckoo ( Lainpi'ococcyx plagosiis). 



