SPECIES. 87 



CUCKOOS. 



One black-billed cuckoo {CoccynuN crythrophtlialmui) and 2 yellow- 

 billed cuckoos {Coccysm americannK, fig. 30) were collected on the 

 Biyan farm in the latter half of Maj'. They had eaten 1 spider, 1 

 click-beetle, 1 sap-beetle {Euphoria iiida), 2 rose-chafers {2fac/'odactylus 

 subsp/nosus), 10 locust leaf -mining beetles ((9(fo?itote(^(3rsa&), 20 beetles 

 of the firefl}' family, 1 skipper butterfly (Budamun), 20 caterpillars, of 

 which 18 were the repulsive, large, spiny, black larvae of the mourning- 

 cloak butterfly ( Vanessa afitiopa), -i bugs, of which 1 was a green 

 soldier bug {Nezara hilaris), and another Metapodius femoratus, 10 

 May-flies, and 20 black insects related to the dobson and known as 

 Sialis infumata. Rose-chafers, which are very destructive insects, 

 are eaten bj- onlj- a few birds. The skipper and cabbage butterflies 

 were the only butterflies eaten by Marshall Hall birds. The larvse of 



Fig. 30.— Yellow-billed cuckoo. 



the mourning-cloak butterfly are often selected by cuckoos, as are also 

 other hairy and spiny catei'pillars that other birds avoid. Caterpillars, 

 largely in such forms, make half of the cuckoo's food, grasshoppers 

 and their allies about a third, and beetles, with small numbers of mis- 

 cellaneous insects, the remaining sixth. . The cuckoo is not abundant 

 on the farm. It is undoubtedly the most useful of the exclusively 

 insectivorous birds found at Marshall Hall, because of the protection 

 it gives to the foliage of forest and orchard. 



EINGFISHEBS. 



One pair of kingfishers was seen continually along the shore of 

 lots 1 and 2 (PL III, fig. 2), and another pair nested in the sandy 

 bluff of the Hungerford farm. The food of the bird has already 



