224 Practical Bird-Keeping. — Correspondence.


sand, and in one corner there should be a small heap of old lime-

mortar.


If a fountain, with proper supply and drainage, is provided

in the outer flight, no water will be necessary in the shed, unless

the birds are for any reason shut in, when of course water must

be supplied in a clean dish such as a glazed flower-pot saucer.


( To be continuedJ.



PRACTICAL BIRD-KEEPING.—CORRESPONDENCE.



THE RESULT OF TRYING TO KEEP VARIOUS BIRDS IN AN

UNHEATED AVIARY DURING THE WINTER.


Sir,—R ecords of failures are often as instructive ill their way as

accounts of successes, and that is my excuse for sending what may seem

rather an unsatisfactory record of an experience in keeping several of my

birds in an ordinary out-of-door aviary during the winter.


The aviary was a good sized one, 17ft. by 4ft., with an average height

of 6 J ft. and boarded on every side except the east; I left the east side

unboarded to enable the birds to get what sun there was, as the south and

west sides were so over-shadowed by large firs and pines that they were

always in the shade. The east side, too, was fairly sheltered from winds,

but to make it as warm as possible I built a little hedge of furze up to about

3^ft. high. In this aviary I made a covered-in shelter, where I hoped my

birds would take refuge in the hardest weather, and then when I had also

boarded over most of the top, I hoped I had made it warm enough for the

birds I had decided to put in.


These weiea pair each of Masked Finches; Yellow-rumped Munias;

Bronze-winged Munias; Jungle Bush Quail; Hemipodes [Turnixpugnax) ;

Stubble or Australian Quail ; a cock Bengalese, and an odd hen Bush Quail.


I turned them in in November, just before leaving home for the

winter, and when I returned in the following April I found a sad record of

disaster.


Both Hemipodes had died and mysteriously disappeared, not a feather

of either having been found. The hen Jungle Bush Quails had both died

from egg-binding, the last one on April 18th ; this one had also lost every

toe of both feet. The cock Australian Quail had died crop-bound. Both

Bronze-winged Munias had died. The hen Masked Finch was dead and

the cock had lost a toe from either foot.


So of the fourteen birds turned out seven were dead in April. The

ones that came through: the cock Jungle Quail; the hen peciom/is; the

Yellow Munias, and the Bengalese; passed the winter in perfect health, in

spite of the fact that during the early part of February there was a heavy

snowstorm from the east which banked up inside the aviary, and that

there were several exceptionally hard fiosts during the winter.


The loss of toes was most certainly, I should say, caused by the frost,

and the cold was also accounted for egg-binding. The crop-binding I

cannot account for.


The Grass-finch probably died from egg-binding as,there was a nest

built in tne furze before I left in November. H. L. SlCH.


[It would interest many of our readers if membeis would send in

records of what birds they have been able to keep in out-door aviaries,

and give also details of the aviaries, how built, and what special precautions

were taken.- Ed.]



