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exactly similar conditions, laid six eggs this year in their nest-

site of 1899, and to my surprise hatched four Goslings, rearing

two of them. Of Ducks a good many of the commoner kinds

were reared ; and we succeeded for the first time in bringing up

some Shovellers. These birds appear to require a great deal

more animal food than any other ducklings that we have reared

here, Eiders excepted. Of these last, I am sorry to say that I

have only one old female remaining. At this time last year I

had a fine lot of seven. But in one fortnight during last winter,

two splendid old drakes, one adult duck and two young birds of

the year, all died in what seemed to be apoplectic fits. In four¬

teen years I have never lost Eiders in this way; and the reason I

believe to be that by a mistake they were for several weeks

allowed access to grain, including maize, thrown down to other

waterfowl. A careful post mortem examination and analysis

disclosed no other cause but this, which had led to the accumu¬

lation of enormous masses of yellow fat about the vital organs.

To complete my misfortune, one of the two surviving ducks got

out of the enclosure, and was caught by a fox the same night.


My Pratincoles, of which I have seven, had suffered a good

deal from frost-bitten feet in the severe weather of the Spring,

for I had no sufficiently warm quarters to offer them. Two pairs

made “scratches,” and in each case one bird (probably the male)

sat hard, but no eggs were laid, though no one would have guessed

this who saw the way in which the bird behaved. These birds

make delightful pets, if allowed room to use their wings. Mine

are comfortably housed this winter, and I hope for better results

when the breeding time comes.


Both Diamond Doves and the charming little Painted

Quails reared yoring ones, but neither of the species of Sand-

grouse which laid eggs, Exustus, or Alchatus, hatched. In

the latter case the aviaries had been fresh gravelled, and the

eggs were broken against the small stones, in several instances

with chicks partly formed. It is not easy to hit off the right

kind of soil for these birds. If too sandy, the sides of the rather

deep “scratch” fall in, and the bird never attempts to remove

the sand, but makes a fresh nest.


My beautiful pair of Snowy Owls, now more than nine

years old, laid their first egg on the 26th May ; and the first

young bird was seen on June 29th. Two fine young, one of

either sex, were safely reared. I hope that, if any of my fellow-

members acquire any of these fine birds, they will be very careful

in regard to food.



