142 BULLETIN 208, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



feet long excavated in the side of a pit belonging to a little Bee-eater 

 Melittophagus pusillus. The nestling was dark green on the back, 

 with sulphur-yellow throat, underparts otherwise white." This 

 obviously was /, indicator. 



At Discovery, Transvaal, Graham Patten (1952) found a nest of 

 this bee-eater on November 11, 1951, containing a young, still un- 

 feathered chick of /. indicator two or three days old and four eggs of 

 the host. This chick, kindly sent me by its finder, is the basis for 

 our figure 4,a-c. 



Another case, in which the specific identity of the parasite is only 

 surmised, but probably correctly, is the following. At Umhlanga 

 Rocks, Natal, I. C. Tait (1952) dug open a nest burrow of a litttle 

 bee-eater on December 9, 1951, and found the occupant to have been 

 brooding five eggs — four of its own — each of which contained a dead 

 and dried-up half-developed embryo. The larger egg agrees in 

 dimensions with those of I. indicator. The four Alelittophagus eggs 

 all had dents or cracks in their shells. 



Melittophagus bullockoides (Smith). White-fronted bee-eater. 



Merops bullockoides A. Smith, South African Quart. Journ., ser. 2, p. 320, 1834. 

 (South Africa.) 



A. W. Vincent (1946, pp. 307-308) found two nests of this bee-eater 

 in the Umvuma district, Southern Rhodesia, on September 24. Each 

 nest contained five eggs of the owner and one of a large honey-guide, 

 probably /. indicator. The two parasitic eggs were fertile. Two of the 

 bee-eater's eggs in one nest and three in the other were addled, having 

 tiny punctures as if pecked or clawed. The two Indicator eggs meas- 

 ured 24.0 by 18.5 and 25.0 by 18.4 mm. On September 21 of the 

 following year a third nest was found with four eggs of the owner 

 and one of the honey-guide, the latter being relatively broader than 

 the two of the previous year, measuring 23.8 by 19.4 mm. The eggs 

 of the bee-eater averaged 22.6 by 18.5 mm. 



B. M. Neuby-Varty has also found the white-fronted bee-eater to 

 be parasitized by the greater honey-guide in Southern Rhodesia. He 

 found two parasitized nests in the same "colony" in a high banl^ on the 

 Winimbe River, Marandellas, in early October 1946, each containing 

 three eggs of the bee-eater and one of the honey-guide; all were fresh. 



At Lake Naivasha, Kenya Colony, on August 6, 1950, John G. 

 Williams found a fully fledged Indicator indicator being fed by a pair 

 of white-fronted bee-eaters. 



Dicrocercus hirundineus hirundineus (Lichtenstein). Swallow-tailed bee-eater. 



Merops hirundineus Lichtenstein, Catalogus rerum naturalium rarissimarum 

 . . . , p. 21, 1793. (No locality; Orange Kiver (ex Levaillant; see Peters. 

 1945, p. 229).) 



