PARROTS. 



351 



ing a dog or cat close to its cage, and it has danced backwards and forwards with 

 out-stretched wings, evidently with the intention of shamming anger, and has testified 

 its glee at the success of the manoeuvre by the most absurd and grotesque attitudes. 

 One trick especially it has, which it almost invariably uses when pleased, and that is 

 to march about with its head twisted round, and its beak in the air, wishing, I sup- 

 pose, to see how things look wrong way up, or perhaps it wishes to fancy itself in 

 New Zealand again." 



FIG. 158. Stringops habroptUus, owl-parrot. 



The kakapo is described as very intelligent, and would make a nice pet were it 

 more cleanly in its habits. Its nest is placed under trees and rocks, and in it, it lays 

 two or three white eggs. It lives in holes in the ground, and its flight is described to 

 be much like that of the flying squirrel. Since the advent of the whites, and the 

 escape into the country of cats, dogs, and rats, these parrots have decreased in num- 

 ber, and their extinction is but a matter of time. 



The single species of Geopsittacus (G. occidentalis) is the ground-parrot of south- 

 ern and western Australia. Little is known of its habits, which are said to resemble 



