14 



CANARY BIRDS. 



softer and better sounding. The food consists, according to 

 Bolle, chiefly, if not exclusively, of vegetable matter, small 

 seeds of a partly farinaceous, and partly oleaginous kind, as 

 well as of tender green leaves and juicy fruit, especially figs, 

 and besides, of all kinds of seeds affected by our indigenous 

 finch species ; thus, the weeds known to us by the name of 

 Kreuz Kraut, groundsel and wegebreit, plantain, will be 

 abundantly found there, as well as water-cresses, and the 

 poppy. 



We must mention yet another principal article of food, 

 which has acquired the greatest reputation in Europe, and 

 which is generally used for feeding the domestic bird, namely, 

 the " canary-grass " which is indigenous to these isles as 

 well as to all the countries surrounding the Mediterranean ; 

 in Germany it is chiefly cultivated on a large scale near 

 Erfurt, and, for a long time, was thought to be the only 

 food for canaries. 



In Holland it was cultivated as early as the second half 

 of the 17th century. Water is an imperative want of the 

 canary ; he flies often to the drinking-place, and prefers to do 

 so in company with others of his kind ; he is very fond of 

 bathing, and wets himself copiously, be he wild or tame. 

 A well-known authority says : The canaries do not eat only 

 the seeds and green leaves of groundsel, sharp sow thistle, 

 mercury (Mercurialis anuna), but they also like to eat insects. 

 I often found them occupied in gathering green flies and 

 similar smaller insects from plants. The capture of the wild- 

 bird is very easy ; Bolle has, in the islands, seen them taken 

 even in simple nets with only linnets and goldfinches as 

 hirers. Usually, as Bocker affirms, a trap-cage is emploj^ed 

 which consists of two lateral divisions, of the traps proper, 

 with a raised stepping-plank, and of a cage for the luring- 

 bird, situated in the middle. This mode of capture is prac- 

 tised in parts abounding in trees, where water is close at 



