328 The Mutation of the Gouldian Finch.


I believe the explanation of Messrs. Thompson and

Abrahams’ statements is the following :—Supposing a Black¬

headed hen bred from mixed parents were unable to secure a

Red-headed mate and therefore had to pair with a mate of her

own colour, any young which she produced could hardly be

expected to show very strong traces of red blood in the plumage ;

such a bird might be the hen figured in my “ Foreign Finches ”

in which there were only one or two small scattered feathers of

carmine on the head : the hen which I bred with last year showed

a trace more red on the head, but was by no means a well-

marked female Red-head; after the autumn moult, however,

there was a very considerable increase of red feathers on the

face of this bird. Anybody looking at the plate of Gouldian

Finches in my book might easily mistake the female there

figured for that sex of P. gouldicz; and in my opinion the birds

observed by Mr. Thompson were Red-lieaded birds of this type

which developed a far more noticeable amount of red on their

faces at their second moult. With regard to Abrahams’ statement,

it is based upon the fact that at a short distance, when the small

feathers of the head are emerging from their sheaths, they do

not look decidedly red, but a greyish or rusty black, according to

whether you see more of the sheath or the feather as the bird

turns its head about; as soon as the feather is far enough de¬

veloped to open out flat the red colour is easily seen.


In my note on “ Mutations in Birds ” in last November’s

number (p. 49), after mentioning that I had bred two young from

the above-mentioned poorly defined P. mirabilis female and a

well-defined male P. gouldicz, I observed that it would be interest¬

ing to see whether they would prove to be Red- or Black-headed

Gouldians: I am now able to clear up that point.


The Gouldian finch is about the slowest in its development

of any finch I know of: in my experience the young are about

six weeks before they leave the nest, to start with. My young

birds left the nest before the end of September last year and by

the end of the following April they were just beginning to

assume their adult colouring ; one, which proves to be a hen, was

in full colour by June 17th and is a typical P. gouldicz, at any

rate I can see 110 red on the face at a distance of eight feet or so ;



