156 BULLETIN 2 08, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Priest (1931, p. 66), at Wedza, near Marandellas, Southern Rhodesia, 

 found an adult male Chalcomiira together with a fully fledged imma- 

 ture Indicator indicator. At his approach they flew to another tree 

 and alighted near each other again. He then collected the young 

 honey-guide. Again, as in the case of the flycatchers, there are no 

 observations to prove any parent-offspring relationship. Priest (1936, 

 p. 102) m.entions this honey-guide as parasitizing a nest of the black 

 tit, Parus niger, at Wedza, Southern Rhodesia. This record he sub- 

 sequently reidentified (in litt.) as referring to the lesser honey-guide 

 {Indicator minor). 



Development of the Nestling 



The greater honey-guide when newly hatched is blind, helpless, 

 devoid of any trace of feathers, has a translucent flesh-colored skin 

 and a pair of small, very sharp, transparent yellowish hooks on the 

 tips of the mandibles, the upper one fitting to the left of the lower 

 one when the bill is closed. Plowes (1948) found such a newly 

 hatched bird possibly one day old, and revisited it 10 days later when 

 he noted: "In the 10 or 11 days since hatching, it had grown surpris- 

 ingly rapidly. The two hooks were still intact, and did not appear to 

 have increased in size, although the bill had now nearly assumed its 

 adult size and shape. Feathers were sprouting from all over the body, 

 and those of the throat were a pale lemon-yellow . . . The eyes were 

 open." 



Skead (1951, pp. 60-61) describes a nestling that he estimated to 

 be about 16 days old but which (in light of Plowes' description of a 

 10- or 11-day-old chick) may have been a day or two younger. 



The feathers were just emerging from the pointed quills all over the body; the 

 back and wings were olive-brown; rump white; abdomen and breast yellowish 

 white, and throat bright yellow; eye about a quarter open . . . 



On the "heel" of the tarso-metatarsus was a little rosette of scales similar to 

 that on a Black-collared Barbet . . . But, most interesting, were the hooks on 

 the tips of both mandibles. The base of the upper hook, where it joined the beak, 

 extended slightly over the upper mandible and, protruding therefrom, in a posi- 

 tion where the egg-tooth would occur in a normal beak, was a minute conical 

 protuberance which had probably served the purpose of an egg-tooth. 



The chick left the nest on January 5 and never returned ... If the chick was 

 16 days old when I first saw it, then the nestling period would have been about 40 

 days which is close to the 38 days of the Lesser Honeyguide. Therefore, when 

 they leave the nest the birds can be considered as well-developed. 



During a large part of its nest life the young honey-guide keeps up 

 a constant purring sound. As Skead puts it, the call of the nestling 

 "is husky and perpetual just like that of the Lesser Honeyguide 

 nestling . . . not dissimilar to the guiding call of the adult but of 

 course undeveloped. It can be heard, greatly accelerated and intensi- 



