Correspondence



185



instead of a female Quail, that is, rejecting a natural wife (as it may be so

termed) and taking to a more-distantly related one !


When in early life I lived at Shirley, near Southampton, I had a

Canary and later on bought two Budgerigars ; and as one of the latter

died and the survivor seemed to be affectionately inclined to the Canary,

I turned them into the same cage, where they lived amicably, They used

to have some amusing squabbles about bathing, because the Canary

(having been with us for some years before the Budgerigar arrived)

seemed to consider it had a right to bathe first; whereas the Budgerigar

often thought to enter the bath at the same time, which occasionally

led to a squabble in the water, and the ejection of one or other bather.

They always roosted side by side. These birds lived at the time of the

European Tree Frogs, mentioned by me in the Field, 1919, p. 752, and

their cage was usually in the same room as the vivarium where the Frogs

were. The Canary never seemed to bother its head about these lively

jumpers. But the Budgerigar used at times to be apparently perplexed

in mind when one or other of the Tree Frogs gave a sudden or extra

vigorous jump at a fly, and landed stuck on the glass. It never seemed to

understand these peculiar creatures ! Personally it seemed to me to be

more frightened for the moment than angry, and I don’t think it would

have ventured too near to the Tree Frogs if all had been turned out

together ! But as the Tree Frogs were special pets of mine, I never ran

any risks of injury by letting the birds approach them.


When on a tour in Yorkshire during the summer of 1904 I was

surprised to see a Crowned Crane (Balearica regulorum) of Africa, wandering

about a farmyard among domestic fowls and ducks—all adults, so far as

I now remember—and the owner told me it agreed well with them, and

had been living there since brought home after the Boer War. Being at

that time engaged mostly with foreign mammals in my spare time, it

did not occur to me to ask whether the Crane was reliable in conduct

with chicks of the fowls or with ducklings. Perhaps some one else can

state more about that subject. So far as I now can remember, the place

was called Pickering.



Frederick D. Welch.



