v°'i™] CHISH(Ji..M. The "Lost" Faradis: Parrot. 11 



by the heha\ iour f)t the l)ir(ls. there was n ) indication of young 

 near the end of that month. Any further history attaching to 

 that nest can be told briefly. 



"In accordance with the suggestion contained in your last let- 

 ter," wrote Mr. Jerrard early in May, "1 opened up the nest on 

 April 24th, there being no longer any doubt that it had been de- 

 serted. The enclosed photographs show the result of that inves- 

 tigation. I was careful not to touch the eggs before photograph- 

 ing them. They had not been disturbed, but seem to be all 

 addled. One was i)unctured and the contents dried up ; another 

 1 broke, and found it to contain nothing but stinking fluid. Xo 

 embryo seems to ha\e developed in any of them. I cannot sug- 

 gest any reason for this state of things. Had the parents been 

 very shy of my hiding-place at first I might suppose that the 

 eggs had got cold. But the fact is that I fixed up the hiding- 

 place about noon on i\Iarch 7th, left it for nearly two hours, re- 

 turned, and after less than an hour's wait the pair came to the 

 mound and the female entered the nest. It was a hot, sunny 

 day, and the mound was like a warm oven, so the eggs could 

 hardly haxe cooled. I left the hutch there that night, but the 

 birds seemed to be quite familiar and unafraid of it." 



Then follow these notes, taken on opening the mound : "The 

 entrance tunnel is about nine inches long and one and a half 

 inches in diameter. It enters the nesting-chamber at the top and to 

 one side, so that the eggs cannot be seen or touched from outside. 

 The nesting-cavity is roughly circular, about 15 to 18 inches in 

 diameter and eight inches high in the middle. The light, honey- 

 comb material in which it is excavated had not been carried out- 

 side (as in the case of the harder material through which the 

 tunnel is bored), but lies at the bottom, forming the bed of 

 the nest, on which the eggs lie. There is no other material what- 

 e\er. The floor of the nest is lower than the ground outside. 

 The eggs, five in number, are white, with a pinkish tinge, and 

 measure .9 in. x .8 in. Both ends are shaped nearly alike. They 

 rest under the centre of the mound. There were no termites in 

 the mound when I opened it." 



Xo further nests of the kingly Parrot have come under notice, 

 but from general observations Air. Jerrard is able to oflfer a few 

 additional notes of interest. In 1921 he saw one pair and heard 

 of another, the former couple bringing out a brood of four or 

 five. This year there was the pair which he studied at the nest, 

 and several persons reported seemg half a dozen of the birds to- 

 gether — two old birds with a family. That is all. Three other 

 mounds have been examined, but the nests were old; one had 

 two entrances, a few inches apart, communicating with one large 

 cavity within. It is regarded as remarkable that during a month 

 of last year in which a pair was under observation they were 

 nexer observed outside of a i)articular area of about two or 

 three acres ; one suggestion is that this was a feeding-ground, 

 and that the nest was some distance oft". Attention wa^^ usurdly 



