l68 Lawrence AND Littlejohns, Nesting of Mistletoe-Bivd. [j^t'^'",",, 



We were naturally very pleased at having been able to photo- 

 graph both birds ; but, as the conditions had been so unfavour- 

 able, we decided to devote the following Tuesday (a holiday) to 

 further observation. This proved to be the most interesting and 

 profitable day of all. Nine o'clock in the morning found the 

 improvised staging again erected before the nest. The birds by 

 this time seemed to take these untoward happenings as a matter 

 of course, and we were able to start operations without delay. 

 The young birds were well feathered, and it was difficult to prevent 

 them from scrambling out. They resented the blocking out of 

 daylight, and fought so strenuously as to cause us some misgivings 

 for the safety of the nest, which was showing a little weakness at 

 the narrow portion through the action of the weather. Both 

 parents again took part in feeding the young, and we were sur- 

 prised to find that this day the food consisted almost wholly of 

 the sticky Loranthus berries, devoid of the outer case. Insects 

 were brought only about once in each six visits. The berries 

 were obtained very quickly from mistletoe growing on the trees 

 near by, most of which were badly affected with the parasite. 

 The female usually brought one fruit only at a time, while the male 

 frequently brought two, and sometimes three. The parents 

 themselves also fed on the berries, both when among the mistletoe 

 and when prevented for any length of time from feeding the 

 chicks. After taking several photographs of the parent birds at 

 the nest we removed the young, in order to make some exposures 

 under less difficult conditions. The adults soon became used to 

 the change, and perched on a convenient stick near the imprisoned 

 brood. They had lost all fear of the camera and of ourselves, 

 and took berries from a small mistletoe branch held out to them. 

 We were then able to see exactly how the berries were extracted 

 from the case. We already knew, by observing the empty cup- 

 shaped portions of the cases attached to the mistletoe, that the 

 seed was extracted without the berry being first plucked from the 

 parasite. We now found that the ripe berry was taken crosswise 

 in the bird's bill, and the soft case split in halves by pressure. 

 The free portion of the case was then dropped, leaving the white 

 berry protruding from the half still attached to the branch. By 

 pressure of this remaining half between the mandibles the seed 

 was forced out sufficiently to allow of its being easily taken in 

 the bill. The birds could not be persuaded to take unripe berries. 

 During the time that berries were to be obtained so near at hand we 

 noticed that one of the fledgehngs, much weaker than the others, 

 was neglected time after time when they were being fed. We 

 took pity on the weakling, and placed it where we thought it 

 would be more likely to receive attention. Evidently, however, 

 the neglect was intentional, and it was fed very little. At the 

 time we were inclined to think that this apparent neglect accounted 

 for the bird being a weakhng, but it occurred to us afterwards 

 that possibly it was fed on insects only, and passed over when 

 berries were brought. This would appear likely from the fact 



