128 THE RED-BACKED SHRIKE. 



observing the tactics of this bird with regard to its prey. 

 Nature has given the Shrike weak feet and claws, but has 

 compensated for this defect by giving it the art of hanging 

 up its prey on a thorn and thus getting the required lever- 

 age to tear it up piecemeal. I have fixed up in the cage 

 of my bird a thorn bough, sharpened into spikes, on which 

 it hangs up everything too large to swallow at once. On a 

 small bird or mouse being given, it commences operations 

 by breaking up the head with its strong bill ; and in the 

 case of a mouse it will smash up the whole of the skull 

 before it can get through the skin to eat it. It almost 

 invariably flies up with its prey in its beak, and always 

 spikes it through the neck, but on one occasion it per- 

 sistently flew up with a Greenfinch in its foot. The spikes 

 had become very blunt with bits of fur and skin, and the 

 Greenfinch would fall every time the Shrike let go, thinking 

 lie had it nicely fixed up. It occasionally takes up a piece 

 of meat to its perch, and tries to eat it while grasped in one 

 foot. While doing so the heel is rested on the perch, and 

 in this position it can do little more than pull the meat with 

 its own foot up and down aimlessly. I have never seen 

 it stand upon its prey and tear it like a Hawk. Feathers, 

 fur, etc., it casts up in pellets, after the manner of Hawks 

 and Owls. A friend of mine has in his collection a Eed- 

 Backed Shrike which was shot in the act of flying away 

 with a young Partridge." Another writer in the same 

 paper says : — " Having kept three species in confinement — 

 viz., the Great Grey, Woodchat, and Eed-Backed — I can 

 assert that they hold their food in one foot, resting the 

 elbow of that leg on the perch to steady themselves, and 

 tearing it with their powerful beaks. They do not place 

 the food on the perch and put their foot on it as a Hawk 

 would do, and in flying with it they invariably carry it in 

 their beak. Food is only hung up for future use." 



