THE



337



Hvtcultural fllbagastne,


BEING THE JOURNAL OF THE


AVICULTURAL SOCIETY.



New Series —VO L. VII. —NO. 12 .—All rights reserved. OCTOBER, 1909.



LEVAILLANT’S BARBET.


Trachyphonus cafer.


By Major B. R. Horsbrugh.


This fine Barbet is common in the Rustenburg district of

the Transvaal. I have only been in Rustenburg a few times,

and then had no time for ornithology, and consequently saw this

species but once. Residents, however, told me it was abundant

at certain seasons, especially when the grapes were ripe and that

it was most destructive to fruit crops, and this I can well believe,

as it is both large and greedy.


It has been recorded from Natal, Rydenburg, Bechuanaland,

Rhodesia and Portuguese East Africa.


According to Shelley, this genus contains four species,

but the present is the sole S. African representative, and a very

beautiful one it is.


There are two of these birds in the huge flying aviary in

Pretoria and I had often admired and coveted them, but in spite

of all enquiries I could never hear of any being offered for sale.


My joy was great, therefore, when, looking in at the window

of a small bird-dealer’s in Johannesburg, I saw two young ones.

I went in and was promptly told that the two young Woodpeckers

—all Barbets are called Woodpeckers in S. Africa—were going

to be sent on approval to somebody living in the country ; but I

left the shop with them in a small cage. They had been hand-

reared by a Boer woman, and were dirty and thin and in wretched

plumage, which was not to be wondered at, as they had been fed



