38 Pkacticai. Bikd-Kkeping. 



bars over the back. A yellow face and blue tail. The cock has 

 a bright blue cere over the beak ; in the hen this is brown, while 

 in the immature bird it is dull bluish in both sexes. 



There is a common variety of the Budgerigar, which has 

 been produced by selection, which is almost entirely yellow, the 

 dark pigment having disappeared from the plumage. Yellow 

 Budgerigars are now so common that the price is little higher 

 than that asked for the normal bird. 



An extremely rare and beautiful variety is the Blue 

 Budgerigar. It was known some twenty-five or thirty years 

 ago, but completely disappeared until Mons. Pauwels, a well- 

 known Belgian aviculturist, exhibited a pair in London in 1910. 

 In this variety the yellow pigment is absent, the bird being of a 

 most beautiful blue, with a pure white face and black bars over 

 the back. 



The CoCKATiEL or Cockatoo Parrakeet {Calopsiilacus 

 novce-hollayidicB), of Australia, is another popular favourite, almost 

 as well-known as the Budgerigar, and equally hardy. It is about 

 the size of a Thrush but with a longer tail. The male is dark- 

 grey with a yellow face and crest, a white patch on the wing- 

 coverts and a brick-red patch on the cheeks. The hen is quite 

 different in colour, being brownish, with the underside of the 

 tail barred with yellow. 



One pair of Cockatiels can be kept in the same compart- 

 ment as Budgerigars, with which they will agree, although they 

 would disagree with others of their own species or parrakeets of 

 about the same size. They are very free breeders, laying from 

 four to six white eggs to a clutch, and producing three or four 

 broods in a season. Both sexes share in incubation, the cock 

 sitting by day and the hen at night, and incubation is commenced 

 with the first egg. 



Canary, hemp and oats are the only seeds required, 

 although these, and, in fact, all parrakeets require green food. 



The Broad-tailed Parrakeets {Platycercjis), of Austra- 

 lia, are mostly quite hardy, brightly-coloured and very desirable 

 birds for an aviary. They require the same food as that recom- 

 mended for Cockatiels. Each pair should have a compartment 

 of an aviary to themselves, and if provided with suitable nesting 



