THE HONEY-GUIDES 161 



to another tree, but shortly the female returned and fed the young 

 honey-guide as before. This attention persisted throughout the rest 

 of the day. 



January 3: During the morning the young honey-guide was fed as 

 usual; not heard crying in the afternoon. 



January 4: Sparrow (male?) noisy, but not in reference to the young 

 honey-guide. The latter became far more active and lively on the 

 wing, and considerably less responsive vocaUy to the approach of the 

 sparrows. 



January 5: Cries of the honey-guide subdued; its tail feathers now 

 long and its flight wholly adult in manner. 



January 6 and 7: Only subdued cries uttered rarely by the young 

 honey-guide, but at 6:20 p. m. on the 7th it flew to a neighboring tree 

 where it met a sparrow and uttered its chattering cry a good deal; 

 later still it was chased relentlessly again by the male sparrow, and 

 fled, crying, in and out among the trees, finally being borne down near 

 to the ground. As before, the female sparrow followed the chase 

 closely. The attack was not renewed a few minutes later when the 

 sparrows again settled near the honey-guide. The latter bird re- 

 frained from uttering its hunger crj in contrast to its usual earlier 

 reaction on the arrival of the sparrows. 



January 8: Young honey-guide seen for the last time in the fore- 

 noon; the sparrows started to build another nest in the same hole 

 where they had reared the honey-guide. 



To summarize, the honey-guide continued to be attended, and to be 

 fed, by the foster parent for nine days after leaving the nest. As far 

 as could be told by observation, unimplemented by subsequent col- 

 lecting, only one of the yeUow-throated sparrows (the female) 

 actually fed it, while the other reacted in a hostile manner as though 

 to a strange and unwelcome species. 



In the same general area as Ranger's observation, F. G. Turberville 

 noted that a j^oung greater honey-guide was fed and attended by its 

 foster parents, a pair of stripe-breasted swallows, Hirundo cucullata, 

 for "about a week" after leaving the nest. 



Whether the fully fledged young bu'ds remain solitary for a while or 

 form loose flocks of their own kind is not certain. Near Maktau, 

 Kenya Colony, I twice saw immature, yellow-throated birds in loose 

 companies of seven or eight individuals around herds of hartebeeste 

 and OTjx. While I could not see if they were actually feeding, it 

 looked as though they were snapping at insects scared up by the graz- 

 ing animals. 



A. Roberts (1917, p. 261) writes that it has been "noted that 

 Cuckoos and honey-guides sometimes visit their offspring." There 

 are no recorded observations supporting this as far as I know, but 



