on the Breeding i?i Captivity of the Tataupa Tinamou. 287


and when they had been with me but a week or so I began to find

eggs dropped about in various places. On October the 4th I

noticed a nest behind a box in a corner of the covered part of the

aviary. It consisted simply of straw, feathers and leaves, the

only materials available at the time : and when discovered it con¬

tained two eggs. O11 the morning of the 6th another egg had been

laid, and incubation, performed by the male only,was commenced.

The female, from the moment her mate commenced to sit, took

no further interest in the proceedings, in fact if she happened to

approach the nest the male would make a rush at her with open

mouth, so that she fled in terror. The male sat well, very seldom

leaving the nest, and when he did so, he always covered the eggs

most carefully with some of the rubbish with which the nest was

•composed. On the 2Sth of October, quite early in the morning, I

noticed the male off the nest, and upon examination discovered

that all three eggs had hatched. Two youngbirds were crouching

in the nest, but the third was just outside, and quite dead,

having apparently left too soon, and got chilled. The other two

were covered by their parent in the nest the whole of that day,

and did not leave until the morning of the 29th. The beginning

■of November was cold, and I thought it best to transfer the

brood to a warmed aviary. They fed well on small earthworms,

gentles, and seed, but although for the first week they seemed to

•do well it was quite the wrong time of year to rear 3^oung

Tinamous, and on the seventh day after their birth one was

found dead. The other lived until a fortnight old, but for some

•days before it died it was decidedly weakly.


The birds were then separated for the winter, as they were

most anxious to nest again. When separated they constantly

called to one another, or rather the female called and the

male answered. The call of the female, which is much more

often heard than that of the male, consists of two or three loud

notes uttered at intervals of one or two seconds, followed by a

rapid succession of similar notes which run into a trill. The

male’s call consists of three notes only, similar to, but some¬

what less full than those of the female.


Early in April the two birds were put together again

and immediately commenced nesting operations. Before laying



