48 Some Doves I Have Kept. 



underwin? roverts. These little birds have bred with me, and 

 also nested high up. On one occasion they used the mouth 

 of one of my Parrot nesting-boxes as a site for their flimsy 

 nest. The young ones reared did not live long with me. I 

 fancy that they must have been injured in leaving the nest. A 

 drop of fifteen feet is rather serious for such tender little 

 creatures. Zebra Doves are usually easily procurable at a 

 low price, and are quite worth keeping as they are very pretty. 

 Two years ago I mated a hen Zebra to my rock Peaceful 

 thinking that such closely related birds would, be likely to pro- 

 duce fertile hybrids, but unfortunately the hen did not lay. 



Bronze-neck Dove. Another pretty Eastern bird, 

 whose scientific name I do not know. They are about half 

 as big again as the Zebra and Peaceful, which they very closely 

 resemble *'in general colour. Both male and female have a 

 band of iridescent feathers around the neck of the same 

 copper shade as the wing feathers of the Australian Bronze- 

 wings. These birds nested with me and two or three pairs 

 of young ones were fully reared. They resembled their 

 parents in all respects except their neck feathers, "which lacked 

 the brilliant copper colour. Dr. Butler inentions a Bronze- 

 neck Dove {Zenaida aiiriculata) in his book, which comes 

 from South America, but this is a 'totally different species. I 

 can find no mention of my birds in his book, or in that 

 of Miss Alderson, so I take it that they must be very rarely 

 imported. ;'.'.* y ' 



Diamond Dove {Geopelia cuneata). This delight- 

 ful little Australian is my favourite amongst all the Doves, 

 Their attractive colouring and pretty ways always attract the 

 notice of visitors, few of whom can believe that such tiny birds 

 can be Doves at all. With me. they always nest very freely, 

 but isome years with better results than in others. I think that 

 care should be taken that an occasional change of blood is 

 introduced. It is also very important to see that they have 

 no nesting material in the winter and early spring, or losses 

 of hens from egg-binding will result. It may even be better 

 to separate the sexes. These birds may be allowed to winter 

 out, if the aviary has a good slicher, but personally I prefer 



