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of last year was well in, and I had given up any idea of the

Gouldians nesting in earnest, they set to work, and on the 25th

October, I had the good fortune to hear the chirp of young

voices in a nest made in the breeding cage, the doors of which

I had fastened open.


Although I was very curious to know how many young

birds there were in the nest, I curbed my curiosity till 17th

November, when, on going to look into the nest, three young

Gouldians flew out fully fledged, leaving two unfertile eggs in

the nest.


They were a sort of a dull grey without anything to

indicate sex or colour of the head, but they had purple spots

round the edge of the mouth, and the under part was a lighter

colour than elsewhere. Their mother was a Blackhead and

their father was a Redhead, both excellent parents, devoting all

their time to the feeding of their offspring, who got stronger and

more noisy day by day.


All three youngsters got on well with the exception of

one little chap who died on 16th December of fits, which seemed

to develop suddenly, but from what cause I do not know. O11

27th November, another nest attracted my attention ; this time

it was in a cocoa-nut husk, and, after leaving it undisturbed for

about eighteen days, I found two young birds in it half fledged ;

but the parents in this case were not so good at feeding their

progeny, and so the latter did not make nearly so much noise

at feeding time, and were in fact, more backward than the first

hatching.


The diet I provided for the new comers was hard boiled

egg, bread and milk, Abrahams’ food, and canary seed and spray

millet.


There is also always plenty of sea sand, red sand, crushed

oyster shell, mortar from old bricks, chalk straight from the pits,

and cuttle shell, and also lump sugar kept damp with water so

as to be more easily broken up by the birds.


By the kind advice of Mr. Wiener, I caused the gas jet in

the bird room (but outside the wire partition) to be lighted at

dusk when the short winter days set in ; and, by erecting a sort

of reflector of tin so as to throw the light on the feeding shelf,

I was glad to find the birds often feeding up to 8 or 9 o’clock at

night, at which time the light was turned down ; and on foggy

mornings the gas is turned on again, and sometimes, alas for

Dondon cage birds, kept on the whole day, to enable them to see

to feed.



