54 My Birds. 



beauty and general interest, so that the aviaries are pretty full — 

 too much so for breeding. 



The two main aviaries are brick sheds, 12ft. x 9ft. x lift, 

 liigh, well lighted and built for the purpose, each with a planted 

 garden flight about 20ft. x i6ft., and 7 to loft high. These 

 sheds are connected by a covered-in boiler house and food 

 room, with a glazed door into either aviary, so that no escapes 

 are possible, and each shed is heated by a radiator to about 60°. 



No. I aviary contains about 50 birds; the usual mixture of 

 .■•mall finches, waxbills, doves and quails. Among the most 

 interesting ana charming of these we find the Grassfinches, 

 Long-tailed, Rufous-tailed, ]\Iasked and Parson, also the Cuban 

 and Quail Finches. 



The Rufous-tailed (Bathilda ntficauda) are amusing with 

 their absurd love dance with a grass stalk carefully held at the 

 extreme end, and we notice that when flying up to a branch to 

 display, they flap as loudly with their wings as a good-sized 

 dove. Cuban Finches {Phonipara can or a) appeal by their tiny 

 size, cheery chirp and quaint black and yellow faces. 



Other favourites in this aviary include a pair of Nonpareil 

 Buntings {Cyanospica ciris), some cock Queen Whydahs {Vidua 

 rcgia), and two cocks of the South African or Eastern variety of 

 the Paradise Whydah (Stcgaiiura paradisea). These seem to 

 be larger and finer birds, and with broader tails than the ordinary 

 Senegal type. 



All these birds have been let out into the garden flight 

 every day this winter, when the temperature has been not less 

 than 45°, and have done well : the total losses since December 

 have been six only, and this in spite of the cold damp climate 

 c 1' the Trent Valley, and the fact that the flights of necessity 

 face west. 



No. 2 aviary, more recently constructed, contains a group 

 of weavers for colour in the summer: Grenadier, Half-masked. 

 Crimson-crowned, and Orange; a Virginian Cardinal, Java and 

 Diamond Sparrows, Blue-winged Lovebirds, and a pair of 

 Isabelline Doves. The rest of the inmates are softbills, collected 

 gradually, with the help of a kind friend in London. It was a 

 long time before we could steel ourselves to the prospect of 

 daily mixing messy soft-food, and chopping up the fruit these 



