WOOD FOR INFANT DIET 105 



mentioned " Coppersmith " could be reared quite 

 satisfactorily on banana only, though, to be sure, I 

 did not get them for this purpose till half-fledged. 

 Among ducklings, too, those of the Mandarin, and 

 sometimes the Wigeon, graze when quite tiny, as 

 well as hunting for insects. 



Birds certainly give some very queer things to 

 their young at times ; many years ago I saw at 

 Oxford Starlings carrying bits of cherries which 

 were not even quite ripe, to their young in the 

 nest, so that I am not inclined to put down to 

 confinement the action of some Indian House- 

 Mynahs {Acridotheres tristis) I Saw a few years 

 ago breeding at the London Zoo, which regaled 

 their offspring with bits of ivy leaves, though 

 liberally supplied with insect food. Mrs. Johnstone, 

 too, who I first bred in this country the lovely 

 Leadbeater's Cockatoo {Cacatua leadbeateri) of 

 Australia, says they fed the young mostly on rotten 

 wood, of all things, a jejune diet which rnakes M. 

 Rogeron's suggestion that Ducks assimilate earth 

 seem more probable. 



But the queerest article of diet for young birds 

 is that supplied them by some of the larger Grebes 

 — their own parents' feathers ; this is, of course, 

 in harmony with the strange feather- eating habit 

 of the old birds, which appear to be able to digest 

 this strange diet, or at any rate to partially do so, 

 since they do not cast pellets — as I know from care- 

 ful observations on captive birds — and comminuted 

 feathers have been detected in their intestines. I 



