NO, 9 CASQUED HORNBILLS — KILHAM 23 



in five nests with entrances visible from the ground. In each the 

 cement had been knocked away from one side of the aperture. This 

 left ample room for the mother and young to emerge. I was interested 

 to find that the missing cement was lying in an intact piece on the 

 ground below three of the five nests. These five nests (Nos. 3, 6, 11, 

 12, and 13, table i) all opened between January i and February 5. 

 Some of these may have been open for a week before I noticed them. 

 Nest 6, however, was closed on the afternoon of January 22 but open 

 by 9:15 a.m. on the following day. There were no hornbills in the 

 vicinity. 



Emergence of iiiotJier and young. — On February 5 I noticed that 

 the female of nest 7, which I had had under observation for 84 days, 

 was still walled in. By the following morning she had left. I began 

 to search the adjacent forest and was able to locate the pair 100 

 or more feet from the nest tree. The female was recognizable 

 by her soiled plumage, the white patches of which were muddy. The 

 male, recognizable by his bill markings, sat close by her. For the next 

 2 hours I hunted back and forth through uncut jungle. It was raining 

 hard and I thought that if I could find the young, I could probably 

 catch it if its plumage was water soaked. The parents expressed great 

 alarm, coming down within 20 feet of my head. Unfortunately I could 

 not find the young. I wondered if it had crawled into some hollow 

 limb. 



I had better success in the Botanical Gardens. The female was 

 walled in on November 8, 1954, and had emerged with her young one 

 on March 7, 1955. She was confined for 119 days, with a possible 

 error of 2 days. There were no signs of activity by the nest on the 

 morning of March 7. Late in the afternoon, however, I found the 

 male perched by his mate 50 yards from the nest tree. He made 

 continuous noises. Several times he hung his head way back, allowing 

 her to nibble the feathers of his throat. Her plumage was in poor con- 

 dition. The white parts of her feathers were soiled, her tail rumpled, 

 and the small feathers on the back of her head and neck were worn. 

 There was no sign of the young one. At 7:15 a.m. on March 8 I 

 located the pair by cries coming from a patch of forest. They were 

 together in a tall tree, and a young hornbill was close by. His plumage 

 was in fine condition, pure black and white, his tail nearly full length, 

 and his upper bill had the large, light-colored growing patch of a male 

 (pi. I, fig. 2). He made squawks similar to those of my captive birds. 

 Everything appeared well when I left. 



The tragedy that overtook the family during the morning may be 

 reconstructed from the chance observations of another bird watcher, 



