on Willow Grozise.



253



water and flint grit, also providing birch branches Jwith catkins

on. These catkins the birds ate greedily from the first, and even

ate an inch or so of the ends of the birch twigs—often being

compelled to give great tngs to get the twigs broken. At the

end of three days I saw something was evidently wrong, as one

of the birds was in a state of frantic terror, rushing up and down

against the wire without any apparent reason, and not eating

freely. As the birds were all wild and shy, I could only ascertain

what was happening by careful watching from a distance. By

this means I found that one of the other birds was bullying this

one, and guessed (as proved to be the fact) that I had got two

cocks and one hen, and that the approach of the breeding season

was the cause of the disturbance. I at once put the cock that

was being bullied into another enclosure, and he soon settled

down. At the end of a few days he commenced to moult into

breeding plumage—turning speckled brown on the head at first,

then going chestnut on the chest and neck, and this chestnut

gradually shaded into dark grey-brown on the back—indeed this

bird was unusually dark and looked at one time as though he were

going to change to black on the back. The flight-feathers and

under-parts remained white. The moult of this bird was com¬

pleted by the middle of April. The other cock and hen began

to moult about the 25th March, but the breeding plumage of this

cock turned out much lighter in colour than that of the first one.

The breeding plumage of the hen, when completed, was very

interesting in the way of rendering her invisible when squatting

even a few yards distant.


About the middle of March, for about a mouth, I supplied

the birds with willow catkins and twigs, as they seemed to like

these a good deal better than birch. The willows that are known

in the trade as “ soft rods ” are very suitable. I noticed the birds

eat grass for the first time on the 27th March, and after that they

seemed to prefer it (when obtainable) to birch and willow twigs.


About the 20th of April a friend kindly changed me my

first moulted cock for a hen. This last bird (which was a very

fine one) arrived in full winter plumage and did not complete

her moult until the beginning of June (about five weeks later

than the other two birds). I may mention that, when the new



