( 74 ) 



SOME BUEEDING-HABITS OF THE 

 SPARROW-HAWK. 



(4) The Nestling. 



BY 



J. H. OWEN. 



When the long incubation-period is over, the egg-shell 

 chips or cracks. Sometimes the young bird will then 

 emerge in a few hours, but the shell of the Sparrow- 

 Hawk's egg is so thick that many hours, usually at least 

 twenty-four (sometimes as long as four days), must 

 elapse before the young one is completely free from it. 

 I have, in fact, watched the old hen help one to free itself 

 from the shell. The first few hours of the yomig bird's 

 existence are spent in getting dry from the moisture of 

 the shell. This is done comfortably under the warm and 

 gentle pressure of the breast of the old hen. The bird is 

 then one of the most beautiful nestlings in existence. It 

 is covered with a short, thick, pure white dowTi, which is 

 thicker and shorter on the head than the body, wliile 

 on the back at the junction of the neck and body it is 

 rather scanty. The leg is bare from the ankle to the 

 foot on the under side, but the down comes below the 

 ankle on the upper side. The legs and toes are flesh- 

 coloured, the talons light ash-grey. The iris is very 

 dark brown, sometimes with a tinge of grey in it, the 

 pupil a very deep indigo. The culmen is short and 

 curved with the base flesh-colour, the point black, and 

 a small white excrescence at the bend. The lower 

 mandible is flesh-colour with a dark ash-grej^ stripe on 

 each side, the tip slightly darker. The mouth and 

 tongue are pink flesh-colour. 



Though verj^ weak when first hatched, the young 

 birds have very great vitality and can exist for a long 

 time without being brooded, though normally the hen 

 broods closely for the first few days. On one occasion 

 on a broiling day in July we kept the mother awaj' rather 

 a long time from a young one not twenty-four hours 



