Correspondence. 199


under surface, the lack of the blue-green spot on the abdomen, yellow'

thighs and superior size.


Salvadori does not mention a blue-green spot on the abdomen, but he

does mention yellow thighs as a characteristic of C. panamensis, and I see

no imoortaut difference in the colour of the beak—“ white with blackish

tip ” {Russ), yellowish with lead-coloured tip (Salvadori) ; then the amount

of red in Amazon Parrots is certainly variable in some at least of the species.


Russ says that C. ochrocephalns and C. panamensis come in to the

market mixed together and are not usually distinguished. As both occur in

Colombia this is quite likely. Is it not also probable that where the two

species occur together they may at times interbreed and thus produce inter-

grades to puzzle the systematist ?


As C. hagenbecki of Russ is not mentioned in Salvadori’s Catalogue, I

thought it might be well to call attention to it. A. G. BuTr.ER.


A RARE HYBRID AUSTRALIAN GRASSI-INCH.


Mr. Hubert 1). Astlev writes from his villaon Lake Como: “ I arrived

here yesterday (Feb. 2bth) to find the whole place like the Swiss Mountains,

at this time of the year.


“ My gardener, who is 27, says he never remembers anything like it

in all his life, and the consequence is that eleven small birds were picked

up dead in the aviary—frozen in the snow—including, alas and alack, a

beautiful and interesting family. Father, mother and five adult off-springs.


“ For two years an odd male Australian Crimson F'inch (Neochmia

phaeton) and a single female Australian Star Finch (BathilJa ruficauda) have

tried to nest. This year they succeeded, only to succumb with the whole

family the day before my arrival ! It is curious that one should have

shewn no trace of it’s father’s blood, whilst the rest were all rather darkly

coloured above, i.e., much darker than the mother, but all had pale yellow

stomachs, and (to a certain extent) under tail-coverts, with dark red-brown

flanks. None of their tails are, I think, as long as the Australian Crimson

Finch’s.


“ One can quite understand a new species gradually appearing from

Hybrids like these. Is it not a great pity to have lost them ?


“ I have had the parent birds for at least four years in an unheated

aviary—two years here and two years on the Riviera.


“ The whole place is deep lin snow, and the birds would not make

use of the shelter provided for them.”


[Mr. Astlev is much to be congratulated on obtaining this most

interesting hybrid. The loss of the whole family through the very

exceptional severity of the weather is most unfortunate. Ed.]


GREEN AND YELLOW BUDGERIGARS.


.Sir, —Could you let me know, if I get a pair of yellow Budgerigars

and put them in with four pairs of green ones, say after I had put the nests

in for a week, would there be very little chance of their crossing with the

green birds?



