54



On Pennants' parrakeets at liberty.



nice bird, except that she was tailless. I released her in the

presence of the old cock who took to her at once, but a few days

later he was ousted by his blue-breasted companion and again was

left a bachelor. Poor fellow ! he was really very unlucky and I

always believe he would have stayed and nested if he had had a fair

chance. But try as I might I could not get him another mate, and

one April morning I was only just in time to rescue him from the

yellow-rump and his first faithless wife, who were pitching into him

in murderous fashion and would certainly have killed him if I had

not driven them away in time. For some days previous he had

been getting more and more restless, calling incessantly, and I sup¬

pose he had ended by throwing caution to the winds and, after telling

the yellow-rump exactly what he thought of him, had fought until

too exhausted to fly. His defeat proved too much for him and he left

very soon afterwards. I regretted his departure but could not in

justice blame him for going.


Ill-fortune also attended the vellow-rump—perhaps he de¬

served it ! His mate nested in an old beech-tree, where he was seen

feeding her, but after a short time she mysteriously vanished and he

left before we realized that anything had gone wrong. Some weeks

later I had the branch cut down to see if we could solve the mystery.

There was no trace of the pennant at all, but there ivas a clutch of

half-incubated rosella eggs, whose unfortunate owner turned up just

in time to see her home fall crashing to the ground. Of course we

had no idea that the hollow bough had a second tenant or we should

never have thought of interfering with it. That the rosellas had

evicted the Pennant is most unlikely, for she and the yellow-rump

were the master pair in the garden.


Better luck however was in store for the blue-breast and his

mate. After inspecting a nest-box in a tree for some days, they

removed to a barrel which I had had let in under the roof of a

building, and there, only a few yards from the rain-pipe which my

first pair had so fruitlessly inspected, a brood of six were safely

reared. To my great surprise the young left the nest in adult

crimson plumage, a fact for which I can offer no explanation,

especially as the nearly-related Port Adelaide parrakeet, always with

me, wears its immature green dress for the full period.



