The First Year of a finsse.r Aviary. 
395 
The shelter is an ordinary matehhoarderl shed, with 
glass window^ protected with wire netting in front, and, with 
a sliding door connecting it with the flight. The size is 
10ft. X 5ft. X 6ft. Gin. The floor is concrete. The flight 
consistf of a space 20ft. x 10ft. x 7ft., the wire netting 
being carried down, and out, into a trench 18in«. deep and 
12ins. wide, which has been ti'led in with clinker to serve 
as a drain and connected with a clinker-filled pit. Tn spite 
of this, our flight was somewhat of a quagmire by the end 
of the winter and we have now installed a pipe drain leading 
the water right oft'. The flight has been planted with a 
I'.amboo, laurel, rlio:le;lendron, and iiawthoi'n, and we are about 
to adii some rambler rose; and a l ox bush. The water supply 
is p-.'imitive, consisting of a shallow cement basin filled daily 
from a can. 
It is perhaps important to add that the aviary is in 
north -ea ;t Sus,->ex and on clay of the very wor.st. 
It was with great excitement that in August, 1913, 
we installed the following hii-ds, one pair of each: Ze1>ra 
Finches, Cordon Bleus, Magpie Mannikins, Green Singing- 
flnches, Spice Finches, Orange-cheeked Waxliills, Bengalese, 
and Red Avadavats. 
Witli the lack of experience of beginners we left th;; 
sliding dooi- oi the shelter open at night too late in the yeai 
with the result that there were several post mortems. done 
by one of us mostly with verdicts of congestion of the lungs 
and nephritis. After November 6th we closed the door and 
only had two more losses (and one of these was due to a fatty 
live)') in spite of a temjierature of 20deg. F. for a few nights 
in the shelter. 
It was during this severe weather that our Mannikins 
first set up house-keeping and produced five young which 
left the nest on the very coldest day and paid the extreme 
penalty for tlieir rashness. In the spring we made good our 
losses and bouglit in addition the following birds: Eib Finches, 
Blue-breasted Waxbills, Hed-billed Weavers, Yellow-ruraped 
Serins, Fireflnches, Cuban Finches, White-throated and l?ed- 
headed Finches, and Zebra Waxbills. These were all put into 
the aviary early in Maj' and were followed early in July by 
a pair of Black-headed Gouldian Finches. These last had 
