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Mr. Hubert D. Astley,



spiders, fresh wasp grubs, live ants’ eggs, and the thing they love

most of all is a small caterpillar. They will eat as many as half-a-

dozen straight off' and take them from my fingers. The other

varieties I have, are new arrivals and will not eat anything so far,

except the syrup, grapes, and green flies. I think they only take to

eating a variety of things after they have been kept for some time. A

bath they all look forward to and have one every morning, summer

and winter. They do best in a bright room where the temperature

does not vary much, and about 60 degrees is quite warm enough.


THE BLACK BREASTED YELLOW BACKED SUNBIRD.


A. saturata.


This bird is the only one of his kind in the country, having

been lately imported by Mr. Frost, and is a perfect pet, being so tame

and gentle in his ways. He is smaller than the Amethyst, but has

a longer tail. In colour he is black, though the back is a maroon

red. Crown of head and a narrow stripe down each side of the

throat a brilliant metallic violet-blue with a steel blue tail and a

yellow patch on the lower back. Very dainty in his ways and

movements; in fact he seems more refined, if I may use this

expression, than all the other Sunbirds. v


To be continued.



MATING OF TWO SPECIES OF IBIS.


By Hubert D. Astley.


For some years I have kept in a large flight aviary two pairs

of the Australian Straw-necked Ibis (I. spinicollis) and three years

ago I turned in a Black-headed White Indian Ibis, near akin to the

Sacred Ibis, which was at the time an immature bird. In the

summer of 1911 one pair of the Straw-necks nested, but just as

the three eggs which were laid were about to hatch, owing to the

bickering and squabbling which went on between the nesting pair

and the pair which had not taken upon themselves the cares of a

family, the eggs were rolled out and broken, shewing young almost

fully developed.


In 1912 nothing happened, but this summer two pairs have



cf. Frontispiece.



