1310 



ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 



moving leaves about it. Gradually I came to 

 know all the more common species^ beginning 

 with the tail-flirting silver-beak tanagers, and 

 before the end of ray week's vigil, I seldom made 

 the mistake of shooting a species with which I 

 was already familiar. 



The great abundance of birds in this par- 

 ticular tree was due of course to the multitude 

 of ripe berries among its foliage. These were 

 the primary cause of attraction. Lacking these, 

 the birds would have had no special reason for 

 visiting it more than the surrounding jungle. 

 It was surprising to discover how many of the 

 birds which usually are essential insect eaters, 

 here had become chronically frugivorous. 



Without exception all the flycatchers were 

 enjoying the berries. This was not so sur- 

 prising in the case of the six manakins and 

 seven cotingas, but the three vireos and five 

 honey creepers were indeed birds of adapta- 

 bility thus to change their diet. The tanagers 

 led all in numbers and gastronomic enthusiasm. 



Little need be said of the casual visitors. 

 A wren hunted insects among the upper branch- 

 es one day, and on another a hawk found a giant 

 snail crawling up the trunk and proceeded to 

 devour it. The insect-eaters of the trunk were 

 nine in number and showed no interest in the 

 berry harvest. Two were woodpeckers and there 

 were seven species of that interesting tropical 

 family of woodhewers. 



These latter are the very essence of pro- 

 tective coloring, and their habits of life make 

 of them wandering bits of loose bark, yet be- 

 cause of their constant motion they are very 

 easy to see even in the dim light of the under 

 jungle. The moment they are quiet they van- 

 ish, and the keenest eye in the world could not 

 recognize them. This similarity of dress is a 

 remarkable feature of this whole family, big and 

 little, short and long-tailed, with beaks blunt, 

 sharp, straight, curved, thick or needle-thin. 

 In these characters they differ, by these points 

 they must know one another. But their pattern 

 shows little variation. Their olives or browns 

 almost invariablj^ warm into rich foxy rufous 

 on wings and tail, while over head and shoul- 

 ders a shower of light streaks has fallen, — bits 

 of sunlight fixed in down. 



And so came to a close my rambling obser- 

 vations on the bird life of this single Canella 

 do Matto. Within the space of a week I had 

 spent not more than twenty hours of neck- 

 racked, vertical observation, shooting whenever 

 necessary, holding up my glasses until my arms 

 collapsed with fatigue. In return I had been 

 able definitely to identify seventy-six species and 



to record the presence in the tree of at least 

 one hundred. In point of actual numbers I 

 kept no sustained record, but during one vigil 

 of two hours' length I counted four hundred and 

 sixteen visitors to the tree. 



When I began I had no conception of such 

 success and as I look back and realize the nec- 

 essary desultory character of my observations, 

 the list seems even more remarkable. Relay 

 observation on the part of two or three watchers 

 for a correspondingly greater length of time, or 

 closer watching from a blind fixed in a nearb}' 

 tree, would yield notes of incomparably greater 

 thoroughness and value. 



III. 



On the last day of my stay, as I was about 

 to leave Utinga, I concentrated my attention 

 on the tree and the surrounding jungle, endeav- 

 oring to fix it indelibly in my mind. I realized 

 that in a few minutes I should leave this place 

 with which I had become so intimate, and should 

 very probably never return. I had demon- 

 strated a remarkable concentration of bird-life 

 when attracted by the ripened fruit of a single 

 jungle tree. It was the unparalleled insurgence 

 of such a variety of organisms as can occur only 

 in the tropics. 



Now that there remained only a brief space 

 of time I tried to conceive of some last thing 

 I could do, to re-emphasize this important phase 

 of tropical life. 



As 1 walked slowly up the trail toward the 

 tree I heard a rustling among the leaves at one 

 side, and in deep shadow beyond a dense clump 

 of scarlet Heliconias I made out a Tj^rant Ant- 

 wren scratching with all its might. To the 

 kicking power of its small legs it occasionally 

 added sudden flicks with the bill, given with 

 such nice judgment and power, that it flung 

 leaves larger than itself into the air and back- 

 ward quite over its body. I had often wondered 

 of what the food of these birds really consisted. 

 Anyone could glance at the contents of a crop 

 and gizzard and label it "small insects." But 

 the actual details of this varied bill of fare, 

 except in the case of very recently swallowed 

 objects are merged and lost in the comminuted 

 mass of legs, elytra and antennae. 



Acting on this hint I brought from my camp- 

 ing stores an empty war-bag, and carefully 

 scraped together a few handfuls of leaves, 

 sticks, moss, earth and mold of all sorts. From 

 directty under the Canella do INIatto, I gathered 

 four square feet of jungle debris, filled my bag 

 and shouldered it. Then I said adieu to mv 



