Thirty-two Years of Aviculture.



295



Turtle-Doves and the Bar-shouldered Dove is especially so. I have

had three examples, two cocks and one hen, the latter only lived a

year, and the two cocks, some years later, escaped into the garden

at the same time as what I suppose was a Deceptive Turtle-Dove

(vide supra ) and were not recovered. I heard that the servant of one

of my neighbours was much scared by one of these birds flying

close past her as she was walking in the garden. The Peaceful

Dove is an exception in the Subfamily, for it really is a tranquil bird

and not pugnacious ; consequently other Doves persecute it. I have

had three pairs and found that the hens were more delicate than the

cocks. I only tried them in indoor aviaries, so never bred them.

The closely related Zebra Dove is a spiteful and quarrelsome little

wretch and gave the Peaceful Doves a bad time, so long as the two

were associated in the same aviary. I never purchased more than

one pair. Of the pretty little Diamond Dove I have purchased three

pairs, two pairs in 1896 and one in 1903. In an indoor aviary I

found that they quarrelled incessantly but never bred ; in an out¬

door aviary they breed freely, and more satisfactorily (as Mr. Seth-

Srnith tells us) when several pairs are associated. They do not

appear to be so hardy as some Australian birds, since I lost the

cock and all the young birds reared in 1907 by allowing them to

spend the winter out-of-doors. At the present time one cock bird

only remains alive. '


Of the Peristerince I have only had two species which, in

spite of their small size, I found the most quarrelsome of all Doves.

The Steel-barred or Picui Dove is especially so, and when he has a

chance does not scruple to barbarously mutilate members of his own

species. I purchased three pairs and subsequently what proved to be

two cocks ; the hens are delicate and I never succeeded in breeding

the species. Of the Passerine Dove I bought a pair in 1899, but

the hen and two others which I purchased subsequently all died

egg-bound. Eventually I turned the cock out into an aviary with

many other birds, some of them considerably larger than himself,

but his impudent charges at them soon made him master of the

entire community ; he fell in love with a lien Bronzewing Pigeon

and always roosted beside her : in 1911 he died.


(To he continued).



