PARASITIC WEAVERBIRDS 151 



In spite of the lack of evidence behind his conclusions, however, 

 Neunzig may have been correct when he decided that the melba 

 finch was the regular host of the paradise widow bii'd. A. Roberts 

 (1939, pp. 110-112), commenting on Neuzig's statement, added that 

 he— 



was long ngo informed bj' Mr. F. E. O. Mors, of de Krom, that the Melba 

 Finch was the host of the Paradise Widow Bird, and Mr. Melville Carlisle of 

 Onderstepoort Veterinary Laboratories also stated the same thing, upon the 

 last occasion, in March last, telephoning to inform me that he had just seen two 

 young Paradise Widow Birds in companj- with a party of young Melba Finches. 

 In April last, when I was in Bulawayo, Captain II. II. R. Stevenson presented the 

 Museum with a clutch of Melba Finch eggs and one of the Paradise Widow 

 Bird, taken in his garden in Hillside, Bulawayo. The birds had been under 

 observation from the time when the Melba Finches had started building their 

 nest, and the large egg was noted but not removed until one day a hen Paradise 

 Widow Bird was observed to drive away the Melba Finches and to sit on the 

 nest, though it did not enter it. 



The larger egg of the parasite was broken and permitted measm-ement 

 only of its width, which was 14 mm. as compared with 13 mm. in 

 the melba finch eggs. On his return to the Transvaal Museum, 

 Roberts examined the sets of melba finch eggs preserved there, and 

 found three of them to contain eggs of the paradise widow bird. One 

 of these sets was taken at Okahandja, South West Africa, April 15, 

 1928, b}^ R. D. Bradfield, and contained three eggs of the parasite 

 and two of the host. Two other sets were collected at Mokeetsi, 

 Transvaal, by F. Streeter, on February 15 and March 17, each of 

 these sets having one egg of the parasite and two eggs of the host. 

 Roberts listed a fom-th set taken at Gorongoza, Mozambique, October 

 3, 1903, by Hany IMiller, but the date seems early, especial!}^ in view 

 of the fact that J. Vincent (1936, p. 115) found paradise v/idow birds 

 to be in breeding condition in Mozambique in March, Ma}^ and July. 

 Plowes (in litt.) found one egg of the paradise widow bird with two 

 of the melba finch in a nest of the latter at Matopos Research Station, 

 Southern Rhodesia, on February 16, 1952. 



Neunzig tentatively identified paradise widow bird eggs in two 

 sets of melba finch eggs collected in southern Somaliland by von 

 Erlanger (1907, p. 18). These identifications, it must be remembered, 

 are only inferred, but I think that they are probably correct. One 

 set of five eggs of the host and one of the parasite was taken near 

 Bardera on May 26. The other had four eggs of the melba finch 

 and one of the paradise widow bird and was collected at Solole on 

 June 11, 



Other writers also accept the melba finch as the host of the paradise 

 widow bird. In Nyasaland, Belcher (1930a, pp. 338-339) concluded 

 that larger eggs found with ordinary ones in nests of melba finches 



