Notes on Sexual Seleclio?i.



217



will sing in answer to a sewing-machine or a frizzling

fry - pan ; and mockers like the Shama ( Cittocincla

macrura ) pick up bad notes more readily than good,

while parrots love coarse oaths.


V. What tastes they do have, run in species and even groups ;

e.g. most typical finches like hempseed, most crows steal,

certain birds always use feathers in their nests or even

snake-sloughs, &c.


VI. They “fall in love” and take dislikes, as anyone may see


with the relations of pet birds to their human associates ;

and it is well known that partridges, for instance, are

best left to pair themselves, and some species, not meet¬

ing in nature, hate each other when brought together ;

for instance, the Paradise Duck ( Casarca variegata) and

Upland Goose ( Chlo'ephaga magellanica'). They may

form bachelor or spinster friendships; and may do this

with alien species and with beasts.


VII. They can discern the sexes of alien birds, even when very


different ; e.g. two different hen common pigeons I had

at different times along with fowls, many years ago, both

became attached to the cock, and wanted him to pair,

but he would not; one also hated the hens, and would

attack them when they could not trample her, by reason

of being on a perch or laying.


VIII. They at once recognise a similarity in note; e.g. I have


heard a Pekin Robin answer the call of the Wryneck

(lynx torquilla).


IX. They recognize their own species independently of varia¬

tions in colour, shape, and size; the behaviour of

domestic poultry of different species (barring occasional

aberrations of conduct, most frequent in turkeys and

ducks) proves this, and yet there is hardly any evidence

that birds go at all by scent. Moreover, allied species

of different colours associate at once, as we see with the

different species of Mannikins.


( To be co?iti?i 7 ied).



