THE



Hvtcultural ®aga3me,


BEING THE JOURNAL OF THE


AVICULTURAL SOCIETY.



NO. 9.



JULY, 1895.



RARE FOREIGN BIRDS.


VII.


SOME RARE FINCHES.


By F. MoERSCHELE.


Amongst the many foreign birds I have kept at one time or another,

none interested me more than some which a resident on the West Coast of

Africa brought over about 18 months ago. Unfortunately, he understood

next to nothing about their treatment, and his ignorance, coupled with

some very cold wet weather between Uisbon and Liverpool, caused him to

lose about ioo out of the 140 he started with. Even the survivors were in

a miserable condition. Amongst them were a pair of Pytelia wieneri, a

cock-bird of Pytelia melba , some pairs of Granatina granatina, (Grenate-finch),

some Red-headed Finches, some Whydahs, a few Red-faced Love-birds,

and some hen Whydahs, and other birds which may be hen Combasous.


Naturally, these rarer birds, such as the pair of Pytelia wieneri, the

cock Pytelia melba, and the Grenate-frnches, which I only knew through

Mr. Wiener’s and Dr. Karl Russ’ books, interested me most. The batch of

Red-headed Finches somehow escaped out of the cage into the bird-room,

and almost immediately—that is, within a week of their arrival—began to

pair, and lay eggs in almost all sorts of places: in cocoa-nut husks, on the

bottom of cages, even in seed-bags. However, only one pair of young ones

was reared, while a number of fledglings were thrown out by either

the parents themselves or some of the other occupants of the bird-room :

I strongly suspedt a Japanese Robin or a hen Virginian. The pair of

Pytelia wieneri, the three pairs of Grenate-finches, and the Pytelia melba cock,

I kept together in a large cage until they had recovered, and then turned

them out in the bird-room, which I have regretted ever since : for not long

afterwards the cock Wieneri got into an empty cage, and when I discovered

it was past recover}^ ; while I lost two of the Grenate-finch hens, later on,

as well as the three cock-birds, through an escape of gas taking place;

the surviving hen Grenate-finch is as lively as possible and sings her little, but

very sweet, song, perched on the cage in which the cock Melba and hen Wieneri

pass their time. The former is quite a diligent songster, certainly the best

of all the African birds I have had, his notes being superior to those of

both the Green and the Grey Singing-finches, although not quite so loud

and strong.


As some of your readers may not have seen a description of Pytelia

melba, I translate it from the work on “ Foreign Cage-birds ” of Dr. Karl

Russ : “ Forehead and upper-throat, bright scarlet-red ; nape of neck, light

grey; back and wings, olive-green ; root of tail, bright red, the tail itself

being bright brick colour; upper part of breast, orange colour, each feather

having a dark spot with a whitish bar ; lower portion presents wavy lines of dark

gre} r and white; the beak is coral-red, rather long and pointed; feet, grey.”

In its general appearance the bird is not built on such elegant lines as the

Grenate - finch. It is about the size of a Combasou, and I should say is a

bird which spends its life in low bushes. So far, I have fed it on millet,



