COLOURS AND PATTERNS OF BIRDS 99 



courtship begins, become still more brilliant, not by a new moult, but 

 by discarding the pale tips of their bright feathers. Such devices 

 are on the whole rare and at the best are expedients which make 

 the feathers last a little longer. Sooner or later, if the plumage is 

 to retain its usefulness or to alter its appearance, it must be 

 changed by a moult. 



The moults are sometimes associated with changes of colour and 

 pattern, and sometimes merely lead to the restoration of the dis- 

 carded dress in a fresh condition. When there is no brilliant 

 breeding plumage, and especially when both males and females are 

 sad-coloured and much alike, the moults may be numerous in a 

 single year and yet the coloration remain uniform. Such dismal 

 creatures are exceptions. Most birds are brilliant for a part of the 

 year, sometimes only for a few weeks of courtship, sometimes for the 

 greater part of the year, and sometimes for the whole year round. 

 The different plumages that birds may assume successively as the 

 results of moults are so varied that it is not easy to get a clear 

 picture of them. I must begin by enumerating them and by giving 

 some examples of them. 



First of all, the chicks may be clad in a coating of down. This may 

 be replaced by. one or more successive immature plumages and these 

 may be followed by different kinds of adult plumages. The adult 

 plumage may be the same all the year round, and in that case the 

 males and females may be alike or different. There may be a 

 specially brilliant plumage assumed in the breeding season, by the 

 males only, or by both males and females. When the breeding 

 season is over, the brilliant plumage may be lost, the birds passing 

 into what is now known as " eclipse " plumage, and this may be 

 identical or different in the males and females. The eclipse plumage 

 is very often seen in winter, as spring and early summer are the 

 breeding seasons, and for that reason it is sometimes spoken of as 

 the " winter " plumage. " Winter " plumage, however, is a mis- 

 leading term, because it extremely often happens that it is passed 

 through long before winter begins. Some examples will make the 

 matter clearer. In winter, the common lapwing or peewit is a dull- 

 coloured bird, with a very short crest, a brownish head, a white or 

 grey neck, and with the back mottled with dark brown. The males 

 and females differ very little. In early spring a moult takes place. 

 The male becomes resplendent, with a long crest, and a body shining 

 with metallic olive-greens and purples, steely-blue and ruddy-brown, 

 picked out with vivid black and white. The female is a less 



