THE HONEY-GUIDES 217 



still appears to be doubtful whether these birds really do lead to honey, 

 I may mention that on May 29th, 1898, 1 myself and one of my natives 

 were guided by a Lesser Honey-Guide to a bees' nest in a hole in the 

 ground." 



Austin Roberts (1911, pp. 73-74), who did know the various honey- 

 guides, found at Boror, Portuguese East Africa, that the lesser honey- 

 guide was much in evidence "whenever chopping trees was under- 

 taken by natives, and then it always sought to lead them to bees' 

 nests," Roberts clung to this statement, refusing to believe that he 

 could have mistakenly recorded data on /. indicator under the name 

 of /. minor, and repeatedly told me so when I was in the field with 

 him in 1924, and disagreed with Godfrey (1925, p. 34), who stated 

 that the greater and the scaly-throated honey-guide both guide, but 

 "who can produce conclusive evidence for the same trait in the 

 Lesser Honey-Guide?" 



According to Chapin (1939, p. 543, footnote), Mr. D. Townley 

 informed him that he had witnessed guiding behavior by Indicator 

 minor on two occasions during some 12 years sojourn in Southern 

 Rhodesia. Unfortunately no details are given. 



Of those claiming that the lesser honey-guide does guide, Swynner- 

 ton, Roberts, and Townley are the only observers with sufficient 

 experience and knowledge to make their notes worthy of serious con- 

 sideration. I would hesitate to discard their statements were it not 

 for an observation I made near Taveta, Kenya Colony, on March 28, 

 1925. On that occasion I saw a lesser honey-guide in a tree near me 

 but almost immediately it flew off to another tree some 30 feet away, 

 I followed it and it flew off to still another tree in which were hanging 

 some native-made hives. It stayed in this tree until I came near and 

 then it flew off and did not return. After about a quarter of an hour 

 of waiting I reahzed the bird was simply gone. The action of the bird 

 did not seem at all purposeful and if I had not been alert to the possi- 

 bility of guiding behavior it would not have occurred to me to think 

 of it as anything other than the way in which so many birds fly from 

 one tree to another when an observer comes too close to them. Look- 

 ing back on this experience many years later I cannot help but think 

 that it was purely a coincidence that some native beehives were hang- 

 ing in the tree to which the bird went, and that it was not really a 

 case of guiding at all. The fact that this coincidence gave it a sem- 

 blance of guiding makes me wonder if possibly Swynnerton and 

 Roberts may not have had a somewhat similar experience, which they 

 assumed was indicative of guiding behavior. To be taken as indicat- 

 ing guiding behavior, the bird should change its activities when arriv- 

 ing at a bees' nest; should do more than happen to fly to the vicinity 

 of one. I therefore conclude that until further and more detailed 



