The Food of Birds 161 
instantly accept changed conditions and flourish under 
the new régime. 
As the range of diet of the whole Class of birds is so 
vast, doubtless the food of the individual species varies 
more than we should ever suppose, but many instances 
are recorded of birds regularly feeding on food for whose 
capture they seem very ill adapt- 
ed. Insects form the staple food 
of all flycatchers and tyrant- 
birds, but the Sulphur Tyrant and 
several others readily devour 
snakes. They dash down at one 
of these reptiles, catch it up in 
their beak, and, flying back to 
a branch or stone, hammer the 
snake flail-like, until its life is 
Fic. er eae Kingfisher battered out. Certain small king- 
Beha fishers living in New Zealand 
have deserted the habits of their group, and subsist on the 
remarkable diet of ‘flies, young birds, and cherries”! 
The change in habits of the Kea Parrot is only too 
well known, especially to the sheep-raisers in New Zea- 
land, the home of these birds. Originally exclusive 
fruit-eaters, they have lately become so fond of the fat 
from the backs of living sheep that they have developed 
into ravenous birds of prey, vivisecting their victims and 
rejecting all but the choicest morsels. Gulls have long 
been known to enjoy an insect diet, and on the pampas 
in the vicinity of Buenos Ayres the people look and pray 
for flocks of gulls as the only relief from the hordes of 
