THE



Bvucultural /Hbaga3me t


BEING THE JOURNAL OF THE


A V! C U LTU RAL SOCIETY.



VOL. III. —NO. 32. All rights reserved. JUNE, 1897.


MY KINGFISHERS.


By Charges T. Rothera.


The bird which, more than any other, I pride myself on

being able to keep successfully, is the Kingfisher. When first I

introduced one into our pool aviary, I was told on all hands that

the attempt to keep the bird in confinement was foredoomed to

failure ; that it was of so wild and retiring a nature that it

would never settle down or take its food, and that it was cruel to

try. I lost two or three, generally within a day or two or a week

at most, and began to think my advisers must be right. But one

day I was watching matters generally, when my man came up

with a can of live fish and proceeded to empty it on to the

shallow margin of the pool. While he was so engaged, the

Kingfisher darted down on to the edge of the can and grabbed a

fish, striking the man’s hand as it made its swoop. I at once

concluded that it would feed when it had the chance, and that

the death of its predecessors must have been due to some

inability to get the fish out of the pool although a considerable

number had been put in, and that they would not resort to the

food pan from which the Waders obtained their supplies and

help themselves to raw meat or chopped worms.


I accordingly pondered the subjedt over, and concluded

that the fish soon became aware of the presence of their natural

enemy above them and sought places of shelter, of which the

pool furnished unlimited provision in the rough stone work of

the margin and island and the groups of water plants, and thus

the birds could not obtain a sufficient supply of food.


I therefore constructed an open pan with perforated sides,

about 18 inches in diameter and 6 inches deep, and floated it with

corks so that it held about four inches of water. Into this a few

live fish are thrown two or three times a day and the difficulty

is at an end. I kept a pair of birds through the whole of the



