34 OOOKATWL. 



males can be distinguished from their sisters by having a perceptible 

 shade of yellow on the head and face. 



In their wild state these birds seldom have more than two broods 

 in the season, but in domesticity, when they are relieved of all appre- 

 hension on the score of food, they keep on breeding pretty well all 

 the year round, except in the depth of winter; but the young that 

 are hatched late in the autumn, or in the beginning of spring, are not 

 always successfully reared. 



The total length of the Oockatiel is eleven inches, of which the tail 

 measures five. 



Like all the Parrot tribe, the Oockatiel makes its nest in the hollow 

 bough of a tree, where it lays a considerable number of eggs, seldom 

 less than five, often seven, and not unfrequently nine, which it hatches 

 in twenty-one days from the date of the deposition of the last of the 

 batch. The male is a most attentive father, sitting on the eggs all 

 day, from five or six o' clock in the morning, during summer, to four 

 or five in the evening, seldom leaving them for more than a few 

 minutes occasionally to get a little food; but when he thinks he has 

 done his duty he comes off, and if the hen, as sometimes happens, 

 appears unwilling to take up her position in the nest, a grand scolding 

 match takes place, and now and then a regular fight. "It is too bad!" 

 he screams, "there, I have been sitting all day, and you have been 

 out enjoying yourself in the sunshine, and now, when I am faint and 

 hungry, and the daylight almost gone, you will not do your duty, but 

 let the precious eggs get cold ! it is too bad I declare, go in at once, 

 wife, go in I say." And if madame does not at once take up her 

 post on the eggs, he chases her about, pecking her sharply, and scolding 

 vehemently all the time; until at last, fatigued by his importunities, if 

 not obeying the call of duty, she pops into the box, settles herself down 

 on her eggs, and he, giving a congratulatory chuckle, flies off to the 

 seed-pan, and makes up for lost time by eating voraciously for several 

 minutes, when he repairs to the water-bottle and has a good drink, 

 then he plumes himself for a little while, and then it is time to go 

 to bed. 



When the young are hatched, however, the lady spends most of her 

 time with them for the first two or three days, during which period 

 she alone appears to feed them; then, as the youngsters get stronger 

 and bigger, she pays less and less attention to them, and the purveying 

 to their wants devolves more and more upon their father; for usually, 

 sometimes long before they have left the nest, she begins to lay again, 

 and these eggs are actually hatched by their elder brothers and sisters, 

 as much as by the parent birds themselves. 



