NO, 4 AVIAN GENUS CLAMATOR — FRIEDMANN 59 



and that only such young magpies as hatch from eggs laid well before 

 those of the parasite can have any chance of surviving. 



Similarly in South Africa, Miss M. Courtenay-Latimer (in Hit.) 

 watched a nest of a hoopoe, Upupa e. africana, that originally con- 

 tained four eggs of the host and one of the parasite. The cuckoo tgg 

 hatched on the same day as the first host tgg ; the other three hoopoe 

 eggs hatched on the following 2 days. The young hoopoes disappeared 

 3 days later, but their eviction or removal was not observed. The fact 

 that they did not disappear until 3 days after hatching argues against 

 eviction by the young cuckoo, and makes it appear likely that they 

 perished in the matter of food competition with it. 



Another case in point is one reported by Meyer (1959, p. 85). 

 Near Que Que, Southern Rhodesia, he found a nest of a glossy 

 starling, Lamprotornis chalyheiis, containing a young great-spotted 

 cuckoo several days old (the quills just appearing on the wings and 

 tail), a young starling, fully feathered and estimated to be 10 to 14 

 days old, a dead young starling, estimated to have been dead for 

 from 2 to 3 days, and trampled into the bottom of the nest, and one 

 cracked, unhatched starling tgg. Three days later the young cuckoo 

 and the young starling were still in the nest ; on the following day 

 only the parasite was there and was seen being fed by the foster- 

 parents ; there was no trace of the missing young starling. Six days 

 later the cuckoo, still in the nest, was fully feathered ; the following 

 day the nest was empty, but two days later the starlings were seen 

 feeding the fledged parasite. Here we have another example showing 

 the absence of eviction by the young cuckoo. In this particular in- 

 stance it would appear that the starling must have hatched some days 

 before the cuckoo. 



In C. levaillantii we still lack such observations but there is no 

 reason for thinking that the picture there is any different. Actually 

 there are unpublished data of N. R. Hyslop (editorially referred to 

 in Bokmakierie, vol. II, 1959, p. 19) that are said to confirm the 

 absence of evicting behavior in this species. In the case of the pied 

 crested cuckoo, C. jacohiniis, alone, has anyone even suggested that 

 eviction may take place and even here there is no conclusive evidence 

 for it. In the few instances where this has been suggested it was not 

 possible to establish that the ejection was deliberate or even that it 

 was done by the nestling cuckoo. 



Skead (1962, pp. 72-73) observed a nest of the forktailed drongo, 

 Dicruriis adsimilis, containing a young jacobin cuckoo and three 

 drongo eggs. Two days later one of the eggs was found on the 



