On Bourke's Parrakeets, and other rare Australian Birds. 203


dark,—below with paler hare-coloured downy feathers, and with

some blackish spots : bill short, with long nostrils, black-brown ;

feet three-toed, long, scaled, grey, with reddish delicate claws ;

eyes black ( Hauth ).


Dr. Russ also gives an account of the courting : but as it

seems to correspond very closely with the method adopted by

these birds in feeding the young, the hen offering a seed to the

cock, but uttering its pairing note instead of the soft nursing

call, I think it unnecessary to reproduce it in detail here.



BOURKE’S PARRAKEETS, AND OTHER RARE

AUSTRALIAN BIRDS.


By the Rev. Hubert D. Asteey, M.A., M.B.O.U., etc.


I feel sure that it will interest our members, and perhaps

cause some of them to break the 10th Commandment, when I

write to say that I have secured four Bourke’s Parrakeets

{Neophema bourkei ) at Genoa. They are all in fine condition,

and I should say they are all from one nest. Being not as yet in

full colour it is difficult to declare their sex ; but perhaps there

are two males and two females. It would seem so ; for two have

smaller heads than the other two, and the lacings on the feathers

of the wing-coverts are less clear.


Should they all be of one brood it is a pity for breeding

purposes ; but one cannot have everything in this life, and it

seems to me that to receive in one day, four Bourke’s, a fine pair

of Many-coloured Parrakeets, and a pair of

BEG I NTH A BICTA,


as well as another pair of rare Australian Finches, which I will

describe; is enough to satisfy a bird-lover for the time being:

not to mention a cock Gould’s Finch, with a wonderful gamboge

yellow head instead of a red one. I11 this bird the green of the

back is lighter, I think, than the usual type. His yellow head

is, as I say, gamboge ; a different tint to the beautiful saffron

yellow breast. The delicate blush rose and forget-me-not blue


* Two other pairs of Bourke’s Parrakeets, probably from the same consignment,

have just arrived in koudon.—E d.



