346 



Bird - Lore 



..'.^ip 



through the branches, I have never heard call but once, though they are fairly 

 common throughout most of tropical America. This one sat in a bare cecropia 

 tree, and did a loud, rough kek, kek, kek, repeated twenty times or more, and 

 I at first took it for a big Woodpecker. 



It is the little black, witch-like Ani, that is really the common Cuckoo of the 

 open savannas, and abounds over the cattle-ranges and around the villages. 



There are a great 

 many common native 

 names for these con- 

 spicuous little black 

 whiners, the common- 

 est being Garrapatero, 

 or tick-eater. This is 

 almost universal, 

 though in Cuba and 

 Porto Rico it bears, 

 from its obsequious 

 manner and its great 

 thin curved beak, the 

 apt title of Judio — or 

 Jew. They are almost 

 always in molt, and 

 look shoddy and worn, 

 and their peevishly 

 whined "ooo-eek" gets 

 to be a mildly annoy- 

 ing accompaniment to 

 the day's work. 



The Barbets and 

 Puff-birds {Capita and 

 Bucco) fall naturally 

 into this group, though 

 they did not give us much to work on as to their notes. Bucco was usually 

 found perching quietly on some twig halfway up in the trees along the road- 

 side or pasture edges. All I remember of him is that he had a buzzing sort 

 of scold, and could bite a piece out of my finger when caught in the hand. 



The little spotted Barbet, however (C. auratus), at Buena Vista, on the 

 eastern foot of the Andes, had a curious little toot that was the despair of all 

 of us till Mr. Chapman associated it with Capito. Hoot-oot . . . Hoot-oot in 

 perfect time — Hoot-oot (blank) Hoot-oot (blank), almost indefinitely. It was 

 a pervasive sound, about as loud as and very like the indi\ddual toots of a 

 Screech Owl, and was given to the invariable accompaniment of the twitching 

 tail, and with the neck humped up and the bill directed downward. 



J'Ul'l'-BlRD {Bucco ruficallis) 



