79



It will be observed that the variation in measurement is not great,

and is probably insufficient to constitute a differentiating sexual character.

The female rami, however, are distinctly rounder than those of the male,

and present a larger surface for muscular attachment, so that the female

jaw must be stronger than the male; which is no more than might be

expected, seeing that the female is the principal, if not indeed the sole,

excavator of the nest-burrow. W. T. GREENE.


A WILD BIRDS’ “LARDER.”


Sir,—A great deal of pleasure, at very little cost, can be had by

making a wild birds’ larder.


A large hawthorn tree grows close to our dining-room window, and

on one of its lower branches we have hung food for the birds. Pieces of

raw bacon-fat and suet can have a hole pierced through, and be tied to the

branch with string. Also ordinary tallow candles, tied through the wick ;

and cocoa-nuts split in halves (a hole can easily be made through them with

a red-hot skewer).


Large and Small Tits, and Cole Tits, come in large numbers, almost

before I have finished tying up the food, and it is very pretty to watch them

swinging from the cocoa-nuts, which are their special dainties. Anyone

who has no tree near at hand to tie the “larder” to, could fasten it to a few

nails in the wooden framework of the window, or could stretch a cord

across it from side to side. Rosie Aederson.



OUTDOOR AVIARIES.


Sir,— I have only a small garden, but a very sunny one. A long

border, which we used to devote to roses, I have now turned into an aviary

which is the home of various foreign birds. I have a Mealy Rosella, a pair

of Orange-breasted Parrakeets (b), some Zebra Finches, and about twenty

Budgerigars, in it at present.


It is thirty-four feet long. One end is the sleeping compartment,

which has a wooden door opening into the flight : I keep it shut in the cold

weather. Two holes are cut in the wooden division, through which the

birds can get in and out. The floor of all is thickly covered with sand, old

mortar, and shell-grit. For bathing, I have a glazed earthenware basin,

very shallow, with plug and waste-pipe. The exact sizes are—length 34 ft.,

height 14 ft., width 10 ft. I may say that it cost about £5 to put it up.


My favourite birds being Parrakeets, and, finding I could not keep as

many as I wished in this aviary, I put up another, which cost me about £ 4.

It is wider, but not quite so long as the first one. My birds seem very

happy in it. I have reared young of Red Rosellas last year, besides

numerous Cockatiels. My hen Pennant died just as I was hoping to have

a nest.


I thought perhaps this little description might interest some of our

members who are unable, for various reasons, to go in for such an elaborate

and expensive structure as the one Miss Alderson described so vividly, and

which, I confess, made me feel horribly envious. M. B. Lancaster.



(A) Cactus Comires, Con urns cactorum. — K.P.



