32



Mr. W. H. St. Quintin,



argued both ways, but there is no doubt that tetrax contents himself

with one w T ife. Last spring my bird would have killed the second

female, after he had made his choice, if w T e had not removed her.

Whether the male would have taken any share of the parental duties,


I cannot say from last summer’s experience. I was only too glad to

see the female settle down quietly to nest, for I knew that we could

supplement her efforts to find insect food for the young, if hatched,

and we removed the male to another enclosure.


There have been varied statements as to the number of eggs

laid by this bird. Authors have accepted too readily the statements

of professional collectors, it seems to me. For example, Dresser, in

‘ Birds of Europe,’ quotes a Mr. Aksakoff as stating that he had

found nine eggs in a nest which he had trodden upon, crushing the

sitting bird. Another Piussian collector is in the same work

mentioned as having “ stated positively that the bird lays from eight

to twelve eggs.” Seebohm (‘ British Birds ’) records finding a nest

with four eggs on the Danubian Steppes, on which the hen bird was

sitting. Here I have never had more than three eggs laid in a

clutch—and the nests of my birds have consisted of a hollow rubbed

out, well protected by a canopy of coarse herbage, and lined with a

little withered grass.


My bird in 1915 laid three eggs, the clutch being complete

on June loth. But, as there was a great quantity of rough g]^,ss

in the enclosure, and we were afraid of disturbing the bird by too

frequent investigations, I could not exactly say when she commenced

to incubate. But in 1909 a single Little Bustard’s egg, placed

under a Silky Hen, hatched on the twenty-first day, which deter¬

mines the length of the incubation period. Two chicks were hatched

in the evening of July 2nd, the remaining egg proving unfertile.


Up to the hatching day the weather was all that could he

desired ; hut, unluckily, a very wet spell set in at that very critical

time. Fortunately, as a precaution, we had got the bird quite

accustomed to a light taken off a garden frame, which, when one

day she was off at feed, was placed over the nest, supported so

that there was plenty of air, and access to the nest from all sides.

This, no doubt, saved the chicks, for we had torrents of rain in the

next five days, aggregating L74 in. The mother bird kept the



