FLEDGED YOUNG. 



93 



over the water, because, in the former case, too much dis- 

 turbance is being caused, and many a young bird is injured. 

 In the Hartz, the birds are caught in the bird-room of an 

 evening ■ firstly, it is noted where each single bird sits, and 

 it is then caught with both hands. This is also sometimes, 

 but the practice is not good, done by day, closing the 

 windows first. After being captured, they are taken into 

 another room, or, at least, into a spacious cage, but, in 

 every case, they must be taken away from the old birds, so 

 as not to hear them any more, because otherwise, they will 

 always lure in their direction and will suffer through long- 

 ing for them. The most appropriate mode to favour the 

 healthy development of the young males, will be to allow 

 them to fly about in the bird-room until the moulting is 

 completely over. Bocker says : Eight days after fledging, 

 when they begin to eat alone, they also commence to practise 

 their song. Those whose object it is less to obtain a 

 copious yield than to train good singers, should leave his 

 young in the hatching-room instead of placing them in the 

 fledging-cage, provided that they have put their best songsters 

 in the hatching-room, as I strongly advise them to do. The 

 young females I remove from the hatch after they have begun 

 to eat alone, and the old ones after they completed breeding, 

 about the commencement or the middle of August, so that 

 they may not, by their unmelodious strophes, spoil the sing- 

 ing of the young males. At the age of a month, or even 

 later, the first change of feathers begins, always except- 

 ing the tail and the wings, which take several months to 

 change. 



During the whole moulting-season, they must be carefully 

 tended, kept particularly clean, and preserved against all 

 evil influences. Towards the beginning or the middle of 

 October, after the moulting of the old birds is entirely 

 completed, the other birds are caught, placed singly in 



