on some habits oj the Kokla in confinement. 131


various parts of India. They are of course monogamous, and

lay the usual two white eggs of the Dove-type, on nests which

are clumsy structures of a few dry twigs loosely put together,

without any lining, and which are placed either in bushes, or on

trees at various heights from the ground. Some other details in

connection with their nidification which I have observed' are :

the period of incubation lasts from eighteen to nineteen days ;

the bird begins to brood after the first egg is laid, and both

birds share in making the nest and hatching the eggs. Both

birds also share in feeding the young. The latter leave the

nest in about three-aud-a-half weeks. The old birds are very

close sitters, not only when the eggs are fresh, but also when

the young are fully fledged. I remember on one occasion

finding a nest, placed on the horizontal branch of a large oak

about 40 feet high, in which the old bird was sitting very hard.

Thinking that the nest contained either hard set eggs or very

young ones, I decided to leave it alone and examine it a few days

afterwards. During the course of the following week, I visited

the nest again, and noticed the old bird sitting in it. O11 climb¬

ing up to the nest, my astonishment can Ire imagined when I

saw the old bird fly off, followed by two young, fully fledged !

Another curious feature about these birds is that, as their eggs

and young suffer largely from the depredations of Jungle Crows

( Corvus macro)■hynchus'), they sometimes show considerable in¬

telligence in availing themselves, during the breeding season,

of the protection afforded them by the more quarrelsome and

powerful species. Now the Dicrnri are notoriously pugnacious

during the breeding season, never allowing Crows, Kites, et hoc

genus omne ever to approach within their “spheres of influence,”

and it is, therefore, not at all unusual to find nests of the Kokla

in close proximity to those of Drongos. The former belonging

to the nests are always allowed free access and regress to the

tree, but it is very different when a stranger shows himself in the

vicinity. In one particular instance that I happened to witness

it was an unfortunate Black-throated Jay ( Garrulus lanceolatus ),

which unknowingly approached too close, and was handled so

severeW by the Drongos that it soon had to make itself scarce.


The male Kokla is by far the handsomer bird, and the



