38 OOOKATIEL. 



that lettuce should never be given to captive birds until it has become 

 "wilted", as the Americans say, in the sun, or even been kept a day 

 or two in the house. Some Cockatiels we once kept in an aviary along 

 with a pair of Eed-crested Cardinals, were accustomed to partake so 

 largely of the insect food, black beetles, mealworms, caterpillars, tipulse, 

 etc., provided for the use of the latter, that we were compelled to 

 remove them; which inclines us to the belief that in their wild state 

 the Cockatiels, like many other members of the Parrot tribe, are by no 

 means averse to an occasional tit-bit in the shape of a fat grub, a white 

 ant or two, or any other succulent insect morsel they may chance to fall 

 in with; but in captivity they do perfectly well without such exceptional 

 dainties; we are, however, without any data as to their habits in this 

 respect in their native wilds, and the insect-eating proclivities of our 

 Cockatiels may quite as well have been an instance of depraved appetite, 

 as a reversion to an ancestral and natural habit. 



With other birds, large and small, the Cockatiel agrees perfectly: 

 in fact it permits itself to be shamefully bullied by a pert male Budge- 

 rigar, or a saucy Bed-rump, without the least attempt at retaliation, 

 and may be kept, with entire safety to the small fry, in company with 

 even the tiniest of the Astrilds, or ornamental Finches. The only 

 approach we ever saw on the part of any Cockatiel to aggressive be- 

 haviour was in our favourite "Joey", who, on the introduction into his 

 domain of a solitary Madagascar Love-bird, flew at the stranger with 

 out-stretched wings and opened beak, so that we immediately placed 

 ourselves in readiness to rescue Aga/pornis coma, should need be for 

 our interference : but there was none, for Joey, having apparently satisfied 

 himself that- the stranger was not a dangerous personage, gave himself 

 no further trouble about him, and he has lived ever since with the 

 Cockatiel family in peace and amity. 



These birds are not, as far as we are aware, given -to forming 

 friendships, much less matrimonial alliances, with birds of another 

 species; but we were once shown a curious looking creature, that was 

 said to be a hybrid between a female Red-rump and a male Cockatiel, 

 to which latter bird it certainly bore more resemblance than to the 

 former; but this is the only instance that has come to our knowledge 

 of such a mesalliance on the part of our exemplary friend the Cockatiel. 



