88 Zoologica: N. Y. Zoological Society. [I; 3 



Tavera naevia {Itmn.) . Four- winged Cuckoo. 



This interesting cuckoo was observed only in the vicinity 

 of the clearings made by the Indians, occasionally along the rail- 

 road track and twice at La Brea. 



It attracted attention both on account of its notes and ac- 

 tions. The more common utterance is a penetrating double- 

 toned whistle, recalling a note of the sun-bittern. When giving 

 it the bird usually perches on the topmost twig of some dead 

 tree. The tone is loud and clear, in a minor key, and the second 

 note is slightly higher than the first (not lower as Chapman 

 says, writing of this bird in Trinidad) .* 



The second call or song consists of six to ten similar notes, 

 uttered in measured sequence, slowly ascending on a minor 

 scale; then the bird slips down three or four tones and carries 

 the scale higher than before, both phrases running smoothly into 

 a single song. 



If one attempts to imitate this latter song the bird pays no 

 attention, but by hiding and giving even a single whistled note 

 near the tone of the first described double utterance, the bird is 

 thrown at once into great excitement. Perhaps in this case it 

 is a male exhibiting anger at the suspected presence of a rival. 

 It answers at once, sometimes adding a third higher half-tone to 

 its call. With looping flight it swoops toward one and so ac- 

 curately does it gauge the single note it has heard that it will 

 often alight directly overhead or at least in the nearest dead 

 tree. Here it shows its excitement by raising the crest feathers, 

 flirting the tail and often the entire body from side to side, and 

 — strangest of all — by repeatedly shooting the dark alulas or 

 thumb feathers out across the pure white breast, the wings being 

 kept motionless all the while and pressed close to the side. 

 Until it discovers the fraud practiced upon it or until its excite- 

 ment dies away, it utters the piercing double-note, perhaps once 

 every three or five seconds. One may stand up and frighten the 

 bird away with a shout, yet a whistle will bring it back at once. 

 The movement of the alulas is observable at other times when 

 the bird is calm, preening its feathers or hopping about the 

 branches of a tree. I never saw one of these birds alight among 

 foliage. 



Crotophaga major Gmel. Greater Ani. 



These curious birds were common in small, straggling flocks 

 all along the Rio Guarapiche and Caiio Guanoco, sailing across 



*Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. His. VI, p. 64. 



