7i



on the Breeding of the Green Avadavat.



I turned these out in a larger aviary, chiefly containing

foreign finches, on the 6tli March. This aviary is 9ft. high, 18ft.

wide, and 45ft. long, exclusive of the covered part, and is planted

with fruit trees, shrubs, and grass.


The change from immature to adult plumage is a very

interesting one. It is completed , in about a fortnight and is

apparently not accomplished by the moulting out of any feathers

but simply by a change in the colouring of the feathers. The

white bars are the first to make their appearance and, when they

appear irregularly (as for instance three on one side of the breast

and one on the other side), they impart a quaint and bizarre

effect to the individual. The dark stripes then appear and

lastly^ the bright buff and orange of the upper and under tail

coverts. I have a note to the effect that by May 18th the four

remaining young birds (three had died) were in full breeding

plumage.


Just at that time the pair of Avadavats in the smaller

aviary went into a heavy moult, casting their plumage freely, but

at the end of June they again went to nest in the same nest box.

And then—as the’piovelists say—a strange thing happened. I

left home on the 21st of June (at which time the Green Avadavats

were in sole possession of their nesting box and apparently

laying) and returned on the 3rd of July. On the afternoon of the

latter day a pair of Masked Grassfinckes were defending the

Avadavats’ nest against the determined attacks of a pair of

Cordons, but the Avadavats themselves were not in evidence.

Looking into the nest I saw several young birds only just

hatched and evidently in bad case for some were on their backs.


Now I cannot positively say that these were young Green

Avadavats, but I have not the least doubt in my mind that the

latter laid the eggs, and the Grassfinclies took possession and

hatched them but were themselves displaced by the Cordons.


Next day the Cordons were in possession and the young

had totally disappeared.


Certainly one of the mysteries of aviary life is what

becomes of seven-tenths of the j^oung birds that are hatched—

they appear to vanish into thin air.


This adult pair of Avadavats made no further attempt to



