Birds of Gambia. 25!^ 



of mosquiloes and other flying things to plague or bite, while at 

 intervals huge slimy beasts, half slug, half caterpillar dro])ped from 

 tlio boughs above. It is in such safe places that the Eambaras 

 breed, and I should think that under such circumstances and in such 

 naturally protective surroundings, their infant mortality sliould be 

 low. Their only enemies here (except for the very occasional small 

 boy who would venture so far after their young) must be the 

 Green Monkeys, and against them the old birds should have splen- 

 did weapons in their terrible beaks; one bitten, by one of these a 

 Monkey would be more than twice shy, for he would carry for 

 the rest of his days in what was lefl< of kis hand and hngers a 

 souvenir, which would make him most chary of ever putting his 

 fingers into holes again to look for Parrot eggs. 



As cage birds, as I said before, I can hardly recommend 

 the Bambaras. I have had a good many at times, a few of which 

 have got home, mostly to the Zoo, but they certainly do not do 

 well in captivity. The young I have almost given up trying to 

 keep, as 1 have never yet known any survive longer than eight 

 montlis, an age too that was only reached by one of my birds 

 most of which died soon after being taken or at any rate within 

 six months. While hand fed they take readily what is given them, 

 chiefly crushed and chewed groundnuts, with perhaps a little bread, 

 biscuit, or boiled rice, and as they get older and begin to feed 

 'hemselves, A\ili eat groundnuts freely, though nothing else, but 

 they rarely seem to thrive. I lliiiik the reason must be that they 

 arc, fed by their parents almost entirely on the seeds or fruit (f 

 the I^'Jangroves, among which they are born, and tliat for this we 

 can supply no efficient substitute. The old birds thrive better 

 or at any rah^- last longer; one 1 had lived two years at the Zoo, 

 after it got there, and there is another therei now, looking as well 

 as a Bambara can look, when I last saw him, who must be more 

 than eighteen months old by now. But even the old ones can 

 hardly be said to do really well in captivity; there is certainly 

 no trouble about getting them to feed when first caught, as they 

 will begin to eat groundnuts within a few hours, and as long as 

 tliese are fresh and full of oil, as we get them here, they do well 

 enough, but after about May, when the nuts begin to get dry and 

 especially later on in England, where the groundnuts obtainable 

 are dried up, wretched little things, compared to the fresh article out 

 here, they apparently get very little nourishment out of their food 

 and gradually decline. If one could get them earlier on to some 

 other suitable Parrot food, such as maize, sunflower, rice, oread, 

 or potato, they would no doubt have a better chance, but most 

 of thos3 I have would apparently rather go hungry than try 

 a new diet; they would sit all day with an abundance of all sorts 

 of good food round them waiting till their master relented and piut' 

 in a handful of their favourite nuts, when down they came and 

 gobbled for all they were worth. The two birds which survived 



