Bird Notes from the Zoological Gardens.



89



The Koel is a purely fruit-eating cuckoo, the male of a glossy

greenish-black colour, and the female a brown bird, which lays its

eggs in the nests of the Indian Crow. Its call-note resembling the

syllables 11 Ku-il,” is repeated time after time, ascending and de¬

scending in the scale, and is one of the most familiar sounds in

India in the Spring.


The Society is indebted to Mr. W. Cross, of Liverpool, for

the valuable donation of a Southern Fruit Pigeon (Crocopus chloro-

gaster), another Indian species, which is by no means common in

living collections, although common enough in its own land. The

prevailing colour is olive green, the breast being greenish yellow and

the top of the head and cheeks grey.


There are now eight species, lielonging to five genera of fruit-

pigeons in the Gardens, and it is much to be hoped that we may be

successful in inducing some, of which we have pairs, to breed next

summer.


The collection has been enriched by the purchase of four

more specimens of the blue variety of the Budgerigar, all of which

are young birds, not nearly so bright in colour as they will be when

adult. We have one adult specimen, a male, which is mated to a

green hen, so the pair should produce some interesting young birds

next season. The blue colouring is very intense, and well set off by

the pure white of the forehead. We know that the yellow variety

of this little parrot occasionally occurs in the wild state (a case is

recorded in the October number of the Emu), and it is hoped that

ornithologists in Australia will keep an eye open for wild specimens

of the blue phase which has so far only turned up in captivity. We

hope soon to be able to exhibit side by side the three phases of this

interesting little parrot.


A bird of very great interest is an example of the rare Nepalese

Eagle-Owl (Hulma nipalensis) from Eastern Nepaul, recently pur¬

chased from a gentleman who had taken it from the nest last April

and reared it by hand. It is a very handsome owl, very light in

colour with large black eyes and long ear-tufts. Only once before

has the species been represented in the collection, and that nearly

forty years ago. D. S.-S.



