TuE Zootocist—Arnrit, 1872. 8027 
plucking, seven months afterwards, and sent the two lots together; and 
they realised a sum equal, after deducting all expenses, to pay 80 per cent. 
per annum on the outlay. The same birds I shall pluck again shortly, 
probably this month, and I fully expect to get over 100 per cent., as the 
plumes are very fine. The next lot I bought I paid more money for, and 
they were only three months old. The demand was just commencing ; 
now the chickens are counted, and in some cases paid for, before they are 
hatched. The young birds do not show the slightest fear of man, and are 
at once as tame as barn-door fowls, and can be driven along the road by 
keeping a boy in front, far easier than any other stock. They begin to lay 
at three years old, but do not generally sit until four or five. In the 
breeding season a cock and two hens are put together in a well-fenced field ; 
they get very savage at this time, and it is dangerous to approach them 
without a long forked stick to hold them back with. A kick from an ostrich 
is a serious matter. The attention of ostrich farmers now is drawn to the 
subject of artificial incubation. As far as I know, only one man im the 
colony has as yet succeeded in hatching and rearing young birds from the 
incubator, and it was a long time before he could manage it. There are 
many difficulties in the way which do not occur in hatching hen and duck 
eggs, but I imagine these will soon be overcome. My stock consists at 
present of twenty-seven, but I hope to increase it to forty-five or fifty this 
summer, as I am so well satisfied with the speculation. I forgot to mention 
that the cocks and hens take turn about in the nest; the former generally 
do duty at night, as their plumage is generally better than the hens’. It is 
wonderful with what regularity thay take their turns, within a few minutes 
of the same time every day. When the young birds are taken away the 
hens soon begin laying again, and frequently bring out three broods in the 
season.—“ Feathers ;” George, Cape Colony, Nov. 15.—F rom the ‘ Field.’ 
Barnacle attached to a Cork.—I have just received a cork picked up on 
our beach, having a white metal capsule “ Cantrell & Co., Belfast. It is 
remarkable as having attached to its sides three large barnacles and several 
small ones.—Thomas Cornish ; Penzance, February 28, 1872. 
Silvery Hairtail in Whitsand Bay,—A single specimen of the silvery 
hairtail was taken on the 1st February, in Whitsand Bay, near the Land’s 
End, and secured by Mr. John Symons, jun., of Mayon. It is of the usual 
size and appearance.—Id. 
- Food-plant of Teniocampa rubricosa.—In June last I found a full-grown 
larva feeding on the seed-vessels of the wild hyacinth (Endymion nutans, 
Druce), which it continued to eat in confinement. The perfect insect 
