Some Practical Remarks on Practical Aviculture. 123


I have still another use for my tunnel. I can, by fixing a

lamp underneath it and covering the outside of the floor with sheet

zinc, use my tunnel as a hot air chamber for ailing birds and many

a bird’s life has been saved in that tunnel.


These uses are not imaginary or illusory. They have been

thoroughly tested and proved absolutely reliable and practical.

Athough this is one of my largest aviaries, I can catch birds more

easily in this than in any other, simply because of this overhead

communication between the two inner flights. As regards furnishing

the shelters, last year I provided one with nice twiggy branches but

bare, and the other with hazel boughs with the leaves on. The

leaves were a great success and provided cover for the small birds,

affording protection from bullies, and the birds relished the leaves

as sheltering places to roost amongst.


As regards vertical or horizontal branches, I rather incline to

the latter, but I employ both kinds. Perches are taboo with me

with certain exceptions. With reference to lighting the aviaries

during the winter, I am inclined to think it is waste of light. The

great majority of birds go to bed at sundown and rise at dawn and

eat nothing between. I give it as my opinion, and therefore only

for what that is worth, that birds suffer no hurt from the prolonged

abstinence during the winter nights. The subject is too big to

discuss in a paper of this kind, but I am prepared to back my

opinion by facts.


Many people are fearfully against ledges. I never could

make out why, except that they get dirty. True, but they can be

cleaned and kept so, and there is nothing a bird loves so much as

a ledge. I suspect it rests the flexor muscles of their legs.


I must leave the shelter or inner flight and pass on to the

flight proper. The dimensions of this must depend largely upon

the room you have, the money you are prepared to spend upon it,

and upon individual tastes in general. A lofty flight has much to

recommend it and everything from a bird’s point of view. It may,

of course, double your cover, and you can grow decent trees and

shrubs in it, but if you ever want to catch up a bird in a great lofty

flight, the trouble then begins. My flights are practically 8 feet

high throughout, and I find that a very convenient height. It gives



