58 BIRD> OF BRITISH GUIANA. 



high tide it is even more tedious, for the boat has to go where- a 

 man otherwise might have gone at low tide, and this necessitates 

 cutting a large channel. 



" However, I am going to trv mv best to send von a satisfactory 

 collection." 



On the Habits of the Hoatzin (Opisthoconuis cristatns) : by 

 J. J. Quelch (Ibis, 1800, p. 327) :— 



"The observations on which the following notes are based were 

 made in March, May, and October 1888, July 1889, and January 

 1800 ; and as they extended over but short periods at each time, 

 no doubt several characteristics have remained unnoted \\ln\h 

 more continuous attention would have revealed. 



" The Hoatzin is known in British Guiana by the various 

 names of ' Anna,^ ' Hanna,' ' C anje, or Stinking Pheasant/ and 

 ' Governor Battenberg's Turkeys' ; but in the districts where it 

 is found the name of ' Hanna ' is the one most commonly used. 

 These birds are plentifully distributed along the Berbice River 

 above the town of New Amsterdam, along the Canje Creek, 

 which opens into the Berbice immediately below the same town, 

 and along the Abary Creek, one of the higher branches of which 

 leads into the Berbice River, and along which the birds have 

 most likely spread, by this channel, from the main stream. Thev 

 are said to extend upward along the Berbice and the Canje for a 

 considerable distance ; but on this point I have no personal 

 knoM-ledge, and reports which I have heard on the subject are 

 conflicting. 



" Where the birds are most abundantly found, the banks of the 

 watercourses are lined by a thick, often impenetrable, and variable 

 growth, which is washed and partially swamped by the water at 

 high tide, and is fronted with a wide and deep deposit of soft mud 

 at low water. Among the plants, a prickly and thorny, low- 

 spreading, much-branched, leguminous shrub or tree, conmionlv 

 known as the ' Bundoorie pimpler ' (Drej'anocarjms lunatus), 

 which stretches out even over the water, rising and fallino- 

 with it, generally occurs in more or less dense masses, together 

 with the ' courida ' (Avicermia nitida) and a tall tree-like aroid 

 commonly known as ' mucco-mucco ' {Montr! chard i a arhorescens), 

 which grows most luxuriantly in the muddy and swampy dis- 

 tricts ; and the young leaves and the fruits of these jilants 

 furnish almost the entire food of these birds. I havo never ^nn^i 



