292 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1946 
The quetzal nests in a hole resembling that of a big woodpecker, with 
a single round doorway at the top. Old woodpecker holes may be 
enlarged to serve its purposes, but at other times it appears to excavate 
a new cavity in decaying wood, male and female working alternately, 
in the manner of other trogons. No lining is taken into the cavity. 
The same hole appears to be used in successive years. 
The eggs are light blue; there are apparently two in a normal set. 
Male and female share the duty of incubation. Each takes two 
turns on the eggs in the course of 24 hours, the female during the night 
and the middle of the day, the male in the early morning and late 
afternoon. There is considerable variation in the actual times of nest 
relief, even from day to day with the same pair; but this general 
scheme seemed to be consistently followed by the two pairs studied in 
detail. Each sex may interrupt its period in charge of the eggs by 
one or more brief recesses. The male sits about 6 or 7 hours each day. 
Quetzals incubate far less patiently than many smaller trogons. 
Upon leaving the eggs at the end of a session, the male sometimes 
rises directly into the air in a flight display. 
The period of incubation is 17 or 18 days. 
The nestlings are hatched with perfectly naked, pink skin and 
tightly closed eyes. The heels are studded with papillate protuber- 
ances. The pinfeathers begin to push through the skin when they are 
about 2 days old. The contour feathers begin to escape their sheaths 
at about the seventh day after hatching; and by the fourteenth day the 
young birds are well clothed on the body but not on the head. The 
eyelids begin to separate at about the fifth day, and by the eighth day 
the eyes can be opened. 
During the first 10 days, the nestlings were fed almost exclusively on 
insects and other small invertebrates. From this age onward, fruits 
became increasingly important in the diet, especially the large, hard, 
green fruits of the laurel family (Lauraceae). The diet of the young 
quetzals was amazingly varied, including beetles and other insects of 
many kinds, larvae, small frogs, small lizards, land snails, and hard 
fruits. Feedings were infrequent; but the portions were substantial. 
Empty egg shells were promptly removed by the parents, who kept 
the nest clean during the first 10 days or so of the nestlings’ life, in this 
respect differing from other trogons. After that, waste matter began 
to accumulate. The big, regurgitated seeds formed the chief bulk of 
this debris, which raised the level of the floor 314 inches, before the 
departure of the fledglings. 
One of the females became inattentive while her nestlings of the 
second brood were growing up. After the seventeenth day she was 
not seen at the nest. During the last 6 days in the nest, and so far as 
