10 BREEDING SEASONS. 



of surkerry grass, whea a little wren warbler {Frinia stewarti) flew 

 up with a straw ia its mouth, suddenly caught sight of me and 

 alighting on a twig close by, looked at me in evident astonishment 

 without moving for two or three seconds, then opening its bill and 

 dropping the straw it gave a most melancholy chee-e-ep. Hooked round, 

 and just at my back, fortunately uninjured, was the nest neatly 

 woven in among the stalks of the grass about a foot above the ground ; 

 it was unfinished, and I left it in peace and moved away. Tapping the 

 trunks of trees with a stick in passing is a good plan, as it will generally 

 put a bird up off a nest that would otherwise sit close and escape 

 observation ; but even with those species that lay in deep holes in trees, 

 a sound of approaching footsteps is often enough to rouse the bird. I 

 once found the nest of a speckled piculet {Vivia innominata) , in this way, 

 seating myself on a bank to rest for a few moments under a tree, and 

 looking up among the branches, a head of a little bird protruded from 

 a tiny hole caught my eye. The bird had been roused by the sound of 

 my approaching footsteps, and was looking out to see the cause. The 

 hole which was pierced in the wood of an old trunk at some distance 

 from the ground was so small that I could only put one finger into the 

 entrance, and was almost invisible until the eye was guided to it. To 

 find nests of this description, such as woodpeckers and barbets, the 

 easiest way is by listening carefully in the woods in the early part of 

 the breeding season when the tapping noise made by the birds in dig- 

 ging out the holes with their bills guides the eye to their position. 



To find nests in bushes and trees when the birds are close sitters, it 

 is sometimes a good plan to disturb the birds by beating the foliage ; 

 but by far the best way is to select the most likely localities where 

 birds are most numerous and carefully search every bush. In open 

 country, with scanty jungle and few trees, every bush and tree should 

 be searched, especially where birds are abundant. Large isolated trees 

 which are so marked a feature in the plains are very favorite resorts, and 

 most of them are more or less tenanted in the season. If the country 

 is quite open, or if the jungle is like the common " beri " thorn 

 jungle, too low and thick to search systematically, better results will 

 be got on horseback t! : on foot, and in such situations many nests 

 may be found while cantering about on a sure-footed pony. When the 

 country is quite bare of vegetation, as in some plains and fallow lands, 

 or even low stubble, a look-out aliould be kept well ahead for plovers or 

 sandgvouse and other birds which creep quietly away from their eggs 



