Hand-Bearing British Birds.



105



It is a rare delight now to have this unique and beautiful

stock within easy access, to study their early plumages and changes, as

yet not all described in books, to note their interesting ways, and

to work out details of handling, feeding, and breeding, under the

auspices of a Government Experiment Station, where scientific work

is understood and appreciated. If only experiments could thus have

been made with the lamented Passenger Pigeon, we should doubtless

have had them alive to-day. We may well hope that from such

beginnings these splendid wildfowl species may be so widely multi¬

plied that extermination will be impossible, and, better still, that

through public interest engendered in their welfare, they may again

become familiar sights upon the w 7 aters of our entire country.


[We are most grateful to the Outing Publishing Co. for so kindly permit¬

ting Mr. Herbert K. Job’s extremely interesting paper to be reproduced in our

Magazine.—ED.]



HAND-REARING BRITISH BIRDS.


By Dr. Arthur G. Butler.


Although many of my experiences in rearing our British

Birds have been published elsewhere, I have never drawn con¬

clusions from my own successes and failures, which might be of

value to others who may be contemplating a similar course.


First of all then I would point out, for the benefit of those

who desire to rear birds for show purposes, that hand-reared birds

will always remain delightfully tame and steady while associated

only with human beings, even though allowed to fly freely in a

room—and in some cases in the open-air : but many of them, if once

associated with other birds in an aviary, become ten times more

nervous than wild caught birds : it almost seems as if the older

inhabitants of the aviary had gone to work to set the new-comers

against their owners and foster-parents. In the case of the Titmice

however we have a notable exception to this rule, for they continue

to be as confiding as ever.


In the second place, if birds are required for song, proper

tutors must be provided, excepting in the case of certain types such



