i8i


then go back again. The young Diuca tried to feed itself on

seed on August 2nd (the cock feeding it on seed as well) but it

preferred being fed to feeding itself.


The eggs of the Diuca Finch are about the same size as

those of the Robin : pale blue-green in colour, splashed all over

with brown, not unlike a Rook’s egg on a small scale.


In November my young Diuca died, after being ill a few

days; it was a fine bird, and I think, from its colour, a hen. I

also lost the cock last March, and have now only the hen left.

She is in splendid health and plumage, and very anxious for a

mate, and has built a nest among the fir branches.


The cock Diuca took a most violent dislike to a cock

Nonpareil, after they had lived peaceably together for sometime.

I had to put each bird into a separate aviary ; and, on bringing

back the Nonpareil in a cage, the Diuca settled on it at once, and

tried to get at his enemy through the wires. Except for this, I

have never known the Diuca injure my other birds, though he

used to chase and tease them, (b)



THE BREEDING OF THE AMERICAN MOCKING


BIRD.


( Turdus polyglottusJ.


By the Rev. C. D. Farrar.


For four years I have been trying to breed the American

Mocking-bird. Of course there will be failures. For three years

I failed dismally. Successes, by which we proposed to make our

rivals green with envy, do not come off. Birds on which we

set our hopes go to the Crematorium, but still we are not dis¬

heartened. Hope springs eternal in the human breast; and so

it did in mine.


For three years I tried valiantly to breed from two cocks.

Perhaps my readers will smile: but it is not so easy to tell a hen

Mocking-bird as some people imagine. I know what they say

in books and Advice Columns in the papers ; I, alas, followed

these guides, only to meet with disappointment. For three years


(6). According to the Museum Catalogue, the Diuca Finch conies from Chili, not

Brazil. Two young were bred in the Loudon Zoological Gardens in 1887 ; it seems to me

to be a free breeder. I have not found the male to be a coward, but abominably quarrel¬

some and vindictive, this summer, in the open aviary, hunting and even breaking a wing

of so active and comparatively large a bird as the Red-whiskered Bulbul. I have at last

been obliged to cut my bird’s wings so short that he cannot fly at all ; nevertheless he has

as much assurance as ever, and, commencing before day-break, sings away all day as if

nothing had happened and he were master of the whole aviary.—K.P.



