252



Avicultural notes from the P.Z.S.



p. 44, hybrid Ducks, and 1901, p. 2, the presence in the Zoo of four

hybrid Macaws ( macao x militaris), which were bred at Milan and

were described as the only known Macaw hybrids in captivity.


A note on p. 33 of vol. ii, 1834, gives an early instance of

Humming-birds in captivity. It says that a Mrs. Barnes brought up

from the nest two of the smallest species of Jamaican Humming¬

birds. Their food was sugar-water, and they were so tame that they

would fly to and perch on her finger. During the passage to England

one was killed by the cage being thrown down in a storm, and the

other drooped immediately and died shortly afterwards.


In the 1854 volume (p. 24) John Gould described the Turaco

(Musophagci rossce), and showed a drawing and a feather shed by a

bird, at that time alive in St. Helena, in the possession of Lady Ross,

the widow of the late Governor of that island. Another living and

at that time rare bird exhibited by this world-famed bird painter and

writer was a Red-billed Toucan ( Rhamphastos erythrorhynchus),

which came into his hands in 1835. (See 1835, vol iii, p. 21.)


In this volume we also find (p. 79) an account of a Great Auk,

which was taken alive in 1834 off the coast of Waterford, and which

lived in confinement for some months, to be eventually preserved in

the collection of Dr. Buskill, of Waterford. This bird was the subject

of a note by Dr. Thompson, of Belfast, at the Zoological meeting of

June 9th, 1835. According to the ‘ British Bird List ’ of the B.O.U.

(1915), the Great Auk became extinct, as regards the British Islands,

about 1840, this Waterford bird being the last but one to be obtained,

there being evidence to show that a later (and last) British example

was captured on St. Hilda in 1840. Outside the United Kingdom

the last pair were taken alive off Iceland in June, 1844. Eighty skins

and seventy-three eggs are recorded as known to be in existence at

the time of the publication of the List.


Notes of interesting first arrivals are those of (1) the Shoe-bill

■(Balceniceps ), on p. 195 of the 1860 volume. This was presented by

Mr. J. Petherick, then Consul for the Soudan, on March 27th of that

year. (2) The Kagu, presented by Dr. G. Bennett in April, 1862

(1862, pp. 84, 107, and a plate, p. 218). (3) The Openbill, first

eceived in 1901 (1901, vol. i, p. 35).



