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fir and hazel branches, nailed up with one end free, are placed 

 inside. The floor of the house consists of six inches of sand 

 which is deep enough to deep it dry. The great difficult}' is to 

 give shelter and have the house open enough for the birds to go 

 in at night ; the birds always have preferred to roost and nest 

 outside and get drowned rather than go inside. 



The flight is planted out with a clump of bamboo which is 

 flourishing very well, also several small Cypress and similar trees 

 from two to three feet high ; these afford good shelter for Quails, 

 and several larger Fir trees, reaching nearly to the top of the 

 aviary : they are grouped together as close as possible and form 

 good nesting and roosting accommodation as long as they live, 

 but are rather too large to move without proper treatment, which 

 one cannot give in an aviary. They have to be renewed every 

 spring, the old ones can be planted elsewhere and covered with 

 climbing plants, etc. 



Round the sides I have put in cuttings of Briars and Wil- 

 lows which, besides affording green fly for such species as eat 

 them, also adds much to the appearance of the aviary, as the 

 Briars were covered with bloom in the early summer. The 

 ground is covered with grass wherever I can get it to grow; this 

 is kept short except for a patch left longer for the Quails to hide 

 in. I try to make things look as natural as possible ; the birds — 

 Grass-Finches and Mannikins — look so much better, to my mind, 

 amid growing greenery than when the floor is cemented down. 



The smaller division is called the slip, being a slice off the 

 aviary of 1907, which was pulled down and rebuilt rather larger 

 than before. This is planted out and furnished in much the same 

 fashion as the larger flight and lies along the West side of it. 

 The house is only about four feet wide and nearly the whole of 

 the front is open ; it is 4J feet to bring it on a level with the 

 other house, so forming a small space 4J feet by 3 feet: this is 

 wired in and forms an outer entrance, inside of which is the door 

 to the flight and a small door into the house. In this were kept 

 some Pekin Nightingales and a pair of Australian Quails. 

 [Nesting Notes, etc. will appear in next issue. — Ed.] 



