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moult; I have seen young males breeding without a tinge of

crimson on the breast. Unfortunately, if kept caged, the bright

colours are lost at the first moult and replaced by feathers of

a bronzy yellow, but in a good-sized aviary, if given plenty of

green food, insects, etc., they will keep almost as good a colour

as those at liberty.


As an aviary bird it is one of the easiest to reconcile

to captivity, and few are more interesting. It lacks much gift

as a songster, but the twitter of both sexes and the few notes

of the male during the breeding season, though not loud, are

very agreeable.


It is one of the readiest species to breed in confinement,

and in an aviary will generally rear young if supplied with

groundsel-tops, flowering grass, etc. : a branch infested with

Aphides is a great treat at this time, every insedt being picked

off and again disgorged to feed the young. A pair in my aviary

reared three broods during the summer of 1895.


The seed of the alder and birch is much sought after as

food, but in captivity they will thrive well on canary and rape

seed : if allowed too much hemp they get too fat and unhealthy.

A little hemp maj^ be given as a change, and it is better to

have it slightly crushed, as Redpolls can only remove the husk

with difficulty, and I have known the cutting-edge of their beaks

considerably damaged with feeding on this seed.


Here, in Hast Yorkshire, this bird is popularly known in

the country as “ French Linnet ” and also as “ Chewy Linnet,”—

the word Chewy, I suppose, somewhat resembling the note

usually given when flying.


In captivity, hybrids have been bred between this bird and

the Greenfinch, Goldfinch, Siskin, Linnet, Bullfinch, and Canary.


Varieties in abnormal plumage are not very rare, and in

all the individuals which have come under my notice, whether

white or cinnamon coloured, the crimson cap has been retained,

though fading, if kept caged, at the first moult, to yellow. A

beautiful bird I possessed, and which was awarded a prize at the

Crystal Palace Show in, I think, 1894, had the head and shoulders

white, but had a brilliant cap and breast; I paired this with a

nearly half-white pied hen, which had two nests of infertile eggs.

At the death of the first-named bird, on dissedtion it proved to

be a female ; it was, I imagine, an old bird, and the fact of its

having a red breast was probably analogous to the not uncommon

assumption of the plumage and spurs of the cock Pheasant by

old, and probably diseased, hens.



