Bird Notes from Kent.



149



into a large open case provided for the purpose, in which the bird

passed four days fairly contentedly.


On the 1st of May the bird was transferred on board the

steamship Zeelandia, when the final stage of its journey to Europe

commenced in a hen house which happened to be on the bridge of

the vessel. The Goose was the chief attraction of my menagerie

which I was bringing to Europe. The collection included a beautiful

specimen of Phrygians princetonianus, which I had caught in Terra

del Fuego ; a pair of long-billed Parrakeets (Henicognathus leptor-

hynchus), which I had brought from Puerto Varas—on the Lake of

Llanquihue, and thirty other birds which I had bought in Buenos

Ayres.


I had taken a sackful of green cabbages on board, as a

supply of food for the Antarctic Goose, which I hoped would last as

far as Lisbon, but the hot weather caused it to last for a shorter time

than I had anticipated, so that it was fortunate that I had a supply

of dried Lutsche, or Kelp, to fall back upon ; which I had brought

from Santiago, and which when soaked in water for about an hour,

looked almost as good as new, and the Goose ate it greedily.


When the ship w T as in the neighbourhood of the Equator, the

bird seemed somewhat unhappy, but it fed well all the time, and

some white feathers began to put in an appearance on its body.

The legs also became much more yellow in colour.


On reaching Lisbon I was able to get a fresh supply of green

vegetables, and on the 29th May, I had the great satisfaction of

landing my bird safely at Amsterdam, and of settling him in his

Dutch home at Gooilust on the same day.



BIRD NOTES FROM KENT.


By E. G. B. Meade-Waldo.


During the past summer, two pairs of Lesser Pintailed Sand-

grouse ( Pteroclurus exustus ) that I obtained from Mr. Barnby Smith

nested and reared their young in our aviaries. The first pair laid

the end of April and hatched two of their three eggs on the twenty-

third day. These young w 7 ere successfully reared almost entirely on

maw seed, as there were no small seeds of wild weeds sufficiently up



