( xxxi ) 



The Bulbul feeding its young on specially protected 

 INSECTS. — Professor Poulton communicated an interesting 

 observation sent to him from the Nilgiris by Mr. H. Leslie 

 Andrewes : — 



' ' Barivood Estate, Guynd P. 0. , Nilgiris, 



"March 19, 1908. 



" This afternoon I was sitting under the veranda, with my 

 head within about five feet of a red-whiskered bulbul's nest 

 containing two young birds about five days old. One of the 

 parent birds arrived with the very last butterfly I should have 

 expected it to have any dealings with, viz., Acraxc violce. It sat 

 on a stalk of the tall clump of cannas in which the nest is 

 built, eyeing me for nearly a minute. I noticed that the 

 butterfly was well in the bird's bill, fii'mly held, with the wings 

 in considerable disarray. The body must have been fairly well 

 crushed, so that the bulbul must have been fully alive to the 

 flavour. I put my head within about three feet of the nest 

 to see how the young birds took it. The bird went down and 

 pushed the butterfly well into a youngster's throat, and it was 

 swallowed immediately, wings and all, and the young bird 

 settled quietly down without seeming in the slightest degree 

 upset. To judge from Marshall's S. African notes the 

 Acrseas are in anything but good odour as food, even when 

 the bird or insect to which they are given is hungry, so that 

 I was rather surprised to find birds voluntarily feeding their 

 young on one. There is other food in ample quantities for 

 them. I spent an hour and a half after tea in seeing what 

 they brovTght. I sat within five feet of the nest with a pair 

 of glasses with which to make things out more clearly. In 

 twenty visits (both parents) I failed eleven times to see what 

 they brought, either through the birds being too quick for me, 

 or through not being able to make out small insects, and so on. 

 What I did see were : — three spiders, one Noctuid larva, two 

 crickets, a bright red beetle which looked like a Lycid, though 

 I couldn't be certain of this (the only other red beetle in these 

 parts of that shade is a velvety Clerid, as far as I know), and 

 a large black and white Hypsid moth, I think Ilypsa compJana. 

 This was crammed into the young bird's throat, and he had 



