6 5



on the Regent Bird.



it—and thus my hopes, such as they were, of breeding Regents

during 1905 faded away and were almost forgotten.


On July 20, desiring to investigate something, I entered

the aviary by a door rarely used during the nesting season, and

had not proceeded many paces when I became conscious of a

sound somewhere about me which, although never heard before,

I knew to be the complaint made by a bird who has a nest hard

by. It was a kind of croaking Fieldfare note, but uttered in a

very suppressed ventriloquial tone, Instantly I slunk out of the

aviary, and took up my position at a window from which I could

watch. I found eventually that the female Regent was sitting in

a hamper which I had fixed up in a corner some 8—9 feet from

the ground. It was suitably tilted, had been partly filled by me

with hay, and had a piece of wood fixed across the lower front

which served the double purpose of a perch and of keeping the

hay in position. When I examined the nest after the young had

left I found nothing but the hay, not a twig had been added.


The exact date on which the bird had commenced.to sit I

could not tell. I recalled to mind that I had not seen her much

about for a few days, that the male had been remarkably quiet

and unobtrusive, and that the second female had been betraying

signs of fear and a desire to escape from the reserved aviary.

Moreover, some three days previously, the male and breeding

female had made a murderous assault (I think the male assisted)

on the Mesias, whose oft-commenced nest was in a thorn but a few

feet away. Never before had I known a Regent attempt to inflict

actual bodily harm on any but one of his own species, and it is

probable that the circumstance marked the laying of the first

egg. Two eggs, the usual number, were laid ; and, judging by the

difference between the two young when they left the nest, one

would suppose that there was an interval of a day between the

laying of the eggs and that incubation commenced with the lay¬

ing of the first. I think that the period of incubation may be

taken provisionally as 19-20 days.


Whilst the female was sitting, the male at first would mount

guard close to the nest. Before long he was joined by the second

female who, for a time, had been afraid to show herself. Soon,

however, they both cleared off.



