PAROQUETS. 223 



in eastern Florida, information was received of their presence near the 

 head waters of the Sebastian River, a small stream flowing into the 

 Indian River near Mioco, and I at once started for this locality. The 

 following notes made on this ti-ip are from the Abstract of the Pro- 

 ceedings of the Linnaean Society of New York city. No. 2, 1890, pp. 5, 6. 

 Since they were written the Paroquet has been fouud to be a locally 

 common bird in the unsettled parts of Brevard, Osceola, Polk, De Soto, 

 and Dade Counties. 



Late on the afternoon of our arrival we started a flock of seven 

 Paroquets from a productive patch of the thistles {Cirsium lecontei) 

 which proved to be their favorite food. Evidently their meal was 

 finished and they were ready to retire, for they darted like startled 

 Doves through the pines, twisting and turning in every direction, and 

 flying with such rapidity they were soon lost to view, the ring of their 

 sharp, rolling call alone furnishing proof it was not all a vision. Two 

 days passed before 1 again met Conurus, and this time to better ad- 

 vantage. It was a wet and drizzling morning when we found a flock 

 of six birds feeding on thistles at the edge of a " prairie." Perched on 

 the leafless branches of the tree before us, their brilliant green plum- 

 age showed to the best advantage. Several were skillfully dissecting 

 the thistles they held in their feet, biting out the milky seed while the 

 released fluffy down floated away beneath them. There was a sound 

 of suppressed conversation ; half-articulate calls. We were only par- 

 tially concealed behind a neighboring tree, still they showed no great 

 alarm at our presence ; curiosity was apparently the dominant feeling. 

 One of the three birds which fell at our flre was but slightly wounded, 

 a single shot passing throiigh the elbow, and his loud outcries soon 

 recalled his companions — a habit which has cost thousands of them 

 their lives, and in part, at least, accounts for the rapidity of their ex- 

 termination — and one alone of this flock escaped. 



There was evident regularity in the_^ habits of the birds we after- 

 ward observed — in all about fifty, in flocks of from six to twenty. At 

 an early hour they left their roost in the " hummock " bordering the 

 river and passed out into the pines to feed, always, so far as I ob- 

 served, selecting thistle patches, and eating the seeds only when in the 

 milky stage. At about ten o'clock they returned to the " hummock " 

 and apparently to some favorite tree, here to pass the rest of the morn- 

 ing and early afternoon, when they again started out to feed, return- 

 ing to the roost just before sunset. A flock of these birds feeding 

 among the thistles is a most beautiful and animated sight; one is 

 almost persuaded not to disturb them. There is constant movement 

 as they fly from plant to plant, or, when securing thistles, they fly with 

 them in their bills to a neighboring tree, there to dissect them at their 



