Birds of N.S. Wales I have caught and kept.



239



side of the cottage was a patch of violets in bloom. At dawn the

Satin birds would come to get the fresh blooms and carry them to

their bower not 100 yards away from the house. Here they would

display, walking almost erect with drooping wings through their

bower, uttering deep guttural sounds. Perhaps, if the English

aviculturist who had some of these birds had given them a supply of

twigs and blue flowers, beads, etc., he might have had a different

account to record of these interesting birds. I often sit concealed in

the aviary to watch them and listen to their peculiar song, which

resembles a sawmill at work. Like all Scrub-birds they are easy

enough to breed. It is supposed to take seven years for the male to

assume full colour.


I would not recommend anyone to keep Cat-birds who is not

fond of babies, for they cry at four in the morning till late in the

afternoon, their voices resembling something between the cry of a

cat and that of a baby. They are the size of Satin Bower-birds,

their plumage being dark green, spotted with white across the

wings, breast and abdomen ; a delightful bird in a large aviary.

An English mulberry tree laden with ripe fruit proved a great

attraction to many Fruit-eaters and Honeysuckers, and especially

so to the Australian Oriole (Mimetes sagittata). The cock

bird is very striking in his dark sea-green coat and whitish

streaked breast and abdomen. Around the eye and extend¬

ing behind the ear is an oval-shaped bare patch of dark scarlet

—very brilliant in a wild state, but the moment the bird is in

captivity the red disappears and becomes a very pale sickly pink.

Probably the fright causes this change, for after long periods of

captivity. I have not been able to bring back that flush to their

cheeks which gives them in nature such an aristocratic appearance."

One of the most beautiful of Cuckoos is the fruit-eating' Koel, a

handsome bird of the same steel-blue coat as the Satin Bower-bird,

but the eyes are a carmine red, the bill hooked and the tail long and

fan-shaped. To catch a rare bird like that is an exciting event, and

the only pity is that to get the bird is one thing, but to get it to eat

and so to live is quite another. With this species they will live as


*Red is a colour which fades in many birds, e.g. the Sepoy Finch, the Red

Sun birds, etc. It generally becomes orange or yellow. But this change does

not take place until the moult.—ED.



