THE HONEY-GUIDES 51 



James, of Cradock, Cape Province (in litt. to C. J. Skead), states 

 that in 50 years he has never been guided by a honey-guide. When 

 he was a young man 50 years ago he worked with a farmer who kept 

 bees as a side hne, and frequently went with him into the bush to 

 capture wild swarms. Honej^-guides often came and sat about while 

 they were working at the bees' nests, but never offered to lead them 

 to any. He further states that his experience as to the absence of 

 any guiding activities by the birds is concurred in by two of his 

 neighbors of long standing. 



In response to a query of mine, J. G. Williams, of the Coryndon 

 Museum, Nairobi, writes me that he has talked to a number of 

 observers who have hved in Kenya Colony for many years and that 

 without exception they tell him that the guiding habit of the honey- 

 guide was very much more widespread some 20 to 30 years ago than 

 it is today. In fact, so seldom is it now observed in some places that 

 many of the recent arrivals in the country doubt the whole story and 

 put it down as an old-time hunters' tale! Williams' own extensive 

 field experience confirms this loss of the guiding habit in many places, 

 especially in the vicinity of large towns or in areas where the natives 

 have become more Europeanized in their way of life; good examples 

 are Nairobi, in Kenya Colony, and Kampala, in Uganda. He 

 writes: "In the former locality Indicator indicator is a common bird . . . 

 and at Kampala it is fairly frequent, but in neither locality have I 

 ever seen the slightest indication of the guiding habit, and even at 

 Thika, Kenya Colony (a good honey-guide locality), the guiding 

 habit is far from common. It is only when one visits areas where the 

 natives are living under conditions little changed by the whites' way 

 of life that one can be fairly sure of observing the unique association 

 between man and a bird. Eventually, I fear, the habit of guiding 

 will disappear entirely as Africa becomes opened-up and 'civilized.' " 



Everywhere I have been in southern and eastern Africa I have made 

 it a point to talk to residents about honey-guides and I was always 

 told that they doubted that the birds guided often enough to get more 

 than a fraction of their food by that means. Furthermore, the fact 

 that other species of Indicator, such as exilis, minor, and maculatus, 

 do not guide but still, on autopsy, show beeswax in their gizzards 

 suggests that honey-guides are able to obtain wax without the coop- 

 eration of man. 



In the more settled and civilized areas where honey-guides have 

 ceased leading natives to bees' nests or, at least, do so less frequently 

 then formerly, this diminution of guiding may be a result of the lesser 

 abundance, if not scarcity or even local extirpation, of the creatures 

 that served to release this behavior in the birds; but it is still more 

 likely that the birds may still lead ratels and baboons and yet be 



