TOURACOUS. 



125 



520), say: "These Touracous are common here, their 

 hoarse croaking ibeing constantly heard in the thick 

 bush. The nest is built in tflie top oif a tree, and is not 

 often found. It is made of sticks, and the eggs are 

 white. We noticed that the birds shot after rain had 

 lost much of the 'brilliancy of the carmine colour of the 

 wing-feathers, but apparently the colour returns after 

 the weather gets dry again." 



In The Ibis for 1904, p. 107, Mr. G. C. Shortridze 

 says of a male Ibkd : "Iris hazed ; bill red ; legs black. 

 In the stomach, berries." And of a female : "Iris dark 

 'brown. In the stomach, wild figs." It would be in- 

 teresting to ascertain whether this is a constant sexual 

 difference, since we know that in many Parrots the 

 colouring of the iris differs sexually. This sipeoies was 

 first purchased for tihe London Zoological Gardens in 

 May, 1870, since when the Society has acquired several 

 other specimens ; it has also got into private hands, 

 and in The Avicultural Magazine, Second Series, 

 Vol. VI., pp. 297, 298, the Rev. Hubert D. Astley, who 

 secured four examples in 1907, has published an account 

 (illustrated by the plate from Messrs. Haagner and 

 Ivy's book) of the nesting of a pair in his aviaries. He 

 says that he feeds his (birds on "Iboiled rice, potato and 

 carrot, with strawberries, cherries, grapes, banana, and 

 sometimes melon." 



GREAT-BILLED, OR ERASER'S, TOURACOU (Turacus 

 macrorhynchus) . 



Above, mantle, body of wing, and tapper tail- coverts 

 glossy violet-blue, varied with metallic green ; flights, 

 as usual, crimson and black ; lower back blacker and 

 less glossy than tihe mantle ; tail glossy greenish viola- 

 ceous, more greenish than the mantle ; head, neck, and 

 front of chest grass-green, which colour shades into 

 blood-red on the terminal half of the crest and the back 

 of neck, but the longer crest-feathers almost deepening 

 to ibliaok ; feathers of hind -crest and nape white-tipped ; 

 naked orbital patch red, bounded in front by a broad 

 white band extending (to the bill, and below by a small 

 patch of black feathers on the cheek ; behind the latter 

 a broad white band extending to below the ear-coverts ; 

 back of chest and remainder of under parts dusky 

 black, partly glossed with green ; bill oranige, olivaceous 

 towards the nostrils ; feet black ; inides brown. Female 

 apparently slightly larger than the male, and doubtless 

 wilhh a stouter bill. 'Hab., "Bast Africa south of the 

 Equator, between Kilimanjaro and Zanzibar. " (Shelley.) 



Captain B. Alexander says (The Ibis, 1902, p. 362) : 

 " In the adult male the upper mandible is yellow, orange 

 at tihe lower part of the base, the lower mandible red, 

 the iris bluish -black ; the eyelids a.re coral, and the legs 

 and feet black. " Russ says : " It is but rarely imported 

 alive. It first arrived at the Zoological Gardens of 

 Amsterdam in the year 1854, and in the years 1866 and 

 1866 it came to the Berlin Gardens." He says nothing 

 about the London Gardens, which also received it in 

 the same years, and again subsequently certainly up 

 to 1890, if not later. 



In The Avicultural Magazine, Second Series, Vol. 

 HI., pp. 26-29, Mrs. Johnstone published an interesting 

 account of the nesting of this species in her aviaries. 

 Unhappily, on this occasion the single young one 

 hatched was not reared ; it, however, afforded the 

 material for a very importtanit paper on the plterylosis 

 of the young Touracou by Mr. W. P. Pycralft (i.e. pp. 

 55-63). Undeterred by her lack of success in 1904, Mrs. 

 Johnstone rpuit up the birds again in the following year, 

 and in The Magazine for 1906-7 (Vol. V., pp. 87-90) 

 she has given a full account o the successful nesting 

 of this species in an outdoor aviary. One young one 

 was reared. 



From what Mrs. Johnsltone says, there can be little 

 doubt that the Touracous in their wild state must, to 

 some extent, feed upon insects as well as fruit, like 

 other tfrugivorous birds. 



RED-CRESTED TOTTRACOU (Turacus erythrolophus] . 



Above with mantle and metallic part of wings golden 

 green ; Iback dull blue, partly glossed wiitih ,golden green ; 

 upper tail-coverlte and tail purplish-blue ; upper part of 

 head and nape blood-red, darkest at ends of nuchal 

 feafthers ; longer (feathers of crest white-tipped ; sides 

 of head and chin white, shading into grass-green on 

 throat, neck, and front of chest ; rest of body dull slate- 

 colour slightly glossed with green ; bill yellow, oliva- 

 ceous towards nostrils ; feet black ; inides brown ; bare 

 orbital ring probably red. Female not differenfbialted, 

 but doubtless with a broader bill. Hialb., West Africa, 

 from Sierra Leone to Angola. 



Monteiro met with this species "pretty aibundanltly 

 to the interior of Novo Redondo" (vide Sharpe and 

 Layard, " Birds^ of S. Africa," p. 143). According to 

 Russ, this species rarely appears in the German bird 

 market. It reached the London Zoological Gardens in 

 1878, and those of Amsterdam in 1887. 



PURPLE-CRESTED TOURACOU (Gallirex porphyreolophus). 



Above with mantle and wing-coverts blue, changing 

 to green towards neck and on least coverts; remainder 

 of metallic part of wings, upper tail-coverts, and tail 

 greenish-blue ; primaries crimson and black, as in 

 Turacus ; remainder o> Iback dull greeniish-fckie ; fore- 

 head, sides of head, lores, chin, and upper neck mettallic 

 green, changing to glossy violaceous blue on crest and 

 nape ; remainder of under surface smoky ash, deeper 

 and partly glossed with green on under tafil-coverlts ; 

 bill and feet black ; eyelids scarlet ; irides dark brown. 

 Female not differentiated. Balb., "South Africa, from 

 the Zambesi through Natal to the Knysna in Cape 

 Colony." (Shelley.) 



Messrs. Stark and Sclateir say >(" Birds of South 

 Atfrica," Vol. III., pp. 218, 219) : "The Purple Lourie 

 i common in the dense bush along the sea coast of 

 Naltal, bub retreats Inland for about fifteen .males, accord- 

 ing to Ayree, in the spring, returning during the sum- 

 mer, autumn, and winter, to the coast. Several birds 

 are often to be seen together, hopping and climbing 

 about among the branches of the larger trees, and 

 playing antics with one another, depressing and expand- 

 ing their tails and displaying the rich crimson of their 

 wings. They have a loud and harsh voice, compared by 

 Shelley to the name often applied to them, ' Tourakoo/ 

 generally heard at early morning 'and in the evening. 

 The food consists of hard, nutty berries and small fruits,, 

 which are swallowed whole." 



Mr. C. F. M. Swynnertpn (The Ibis. 1907, pp. 294- 

 296) publishes the following valuable notes on this 

 species: "This is the Touraco of the open woods, 

 and is particularly fond of the large trees and clumips 

 of dense bush growing on ant-heaps ; it may often be 

 seen flying from clump to clump, and traversing each 

 Avith three or four long hops before proceeding to the 

 next. I have never found it in the forest. It is a bold 

 and strikingly-coloured bird, but quite lacks the grace 

 and soft beauty of the preceding speoies (Livingstone's 

 Touracou). Two young birds were brought to me by 

 a native in February, 1905 ; he stated that the nest was 

 placed in a bush, ten or twelve feet from the ground, 

 and resemlbled that of a Dove, and that two was the 

 usual number of the clutch. One of these fledglings has 

 survived, having been kept till recently in a large aviary 

 with a numlber of other birds, towards which, however, 



