ii8 BIRD BEHAVIOUR 



thrust unceremoniously down its throat. B^* in 

 the case of Penguins and of the Pelican, group, 

 including Cormorants and Gannets, matters go 

 much further ; at any rate the young bird does, 

 for it gets its head and even neck well down the 

 long-suffering parent's gullet. 



I well remember in Calcutta getting hold of a 

 fledging young nestling of the Darter or Snake- 

 bird, which was brought to the market for sale 

 half-reared. It was charmingly tame, but the 

 head, at the end of its long slender neck, wobbled 

 most provokingly when I tried to feed it, so that, 

 eager though it was for the fish I offered, it was a 

 difficult matter to get one placed in its mouth. 

 The obvious move that suggested itself was of 

 course to hold the wobbling head in one's hand 

 to steady it ; and to my intense surprise, as soon 

 as I did this, the bird's mouth suddenly expanded 

 to about twice its previous size, so that it looked 

 like a funnel: Obviously the clasp of my hand 

 reproduced the pressure of the parent's gullet, to 

 which the nestling instinctively responded. 



Since then I have read an interesting note by 

 Miss R. Alderson, a keen amateur of Doves, about 

 her difficulties in getting food into the mouth of 

 a very young Dove-nestling she was rearing, until 

 its beak happened to slip between her fingers, when 

 it opened it at once, and was thereafter fed quite 

 ea«ily ; evidently in this case a little pressure to 

 represent the feel of the parent's bill was all that 

 was needed. 



