THE HONEY-GUIDES 261 



to and looking into the holes in the bank of a donga occupied by pied 

 starlings {Spreo bicolor) and horus swifts (Alicropus horus). It 

 entered several holes, disappearing into some for a second or two, 

 before flying off. 



Songs and Calls 



On most of the 10 or 12 times that I have observed this bird it was 

 silent, but on a few occasions I heard it give a low, guttural tsip or 

 isep, repeated two or tlu-ee times; and a wounded bird gave a rather 

 nasal rasping scream several times in rapid succession when I picked it 

 up. Vincent (in A. Roberts, 1930b) describes the usual note he heard 

 as a loud, rasping zeet, zeet. He also mentions that as the birds, 

 restlessly flitting about in the trees, were on the point of alighting they 

 uttered a subdued, but harsh, squeaking, stuttering chatter. Chiaz- 

 zari (m litt.) renders the usual note in the same way as Vincent, zeet. 



Late in winter (August 30) near Howick, Natal, I saw a Prodotiscus 

 regulus fly up from a blackberry thicket where it had been associating 

 with some waxbifls {Lagonosticta and Estrilda) and perch about 15 

 feet up in a small dead tree. It immediately sat up very erectly, 

 threw its head back, and began to sing, giving two notes tseeeu tseeeu, 

 something like those of the Cape canary Serinus canicollis. As it sang 

 it pumped its tail several times and showed the white outer rectrices. 

 I shot it and found it was an immature female with completely white 

 outer tail feathers. The ovary was only slightly enlarged. If this 

 performance was a "song" and not merely "call notes," it follows that 

 the female sings. The way in which the bird threw back its head 

 when starting to utter its notes reminded me of the way male birds 

 frequently do when singing; it was a great surprise to find, on dissec- 

 tion, that the bird was a female. 



Food and Feeding Habits 



Adult: A number of observations of the sharp-billed honey-guide's 

 method of feeding are available. Millar, near Durban (cited by 

 Stark and Sclater, 1903, p. 156) found it fed on small insects generally, 

 and often remained on one tree for a considerable time, seeking its food. 

 In the eastern Cape Province, Skead (in litt.) watched one feeding 

 leisurely in an acacia thicket. The bird would sit on a branch, 

 cocking its head first one way, then the other, looking for food, which, 

 if seen, was then taken. If none was found, it would flit to another 

 branch and repeat the action. It differed in its food-finding from the 

 Cape white-eyes {Zosterops capensis) and the black tits (Parus niger) 

 with which it was associated m that it did not peer among the leaves 

 as did these two species, but merely looked about, first in one direc- 



