.1// Rii^hts Reserved. 
July, 1921. 
BIRD NOTES: 
THE 
JOURNAL OF THE FOREIGN BIRD CLUB 
, The Breeding of the Lesser Diuca Finch 
(Diuca minor) 
By W. Shore Baily. 
Away back last autumn Mr. Rogers, of Liverpool, wrote 
ux- that he had some new Finches just arrived from the Argen- 
tine, so I asked him to send them on, as I am always interested 
in any new variety of seed-eater. ( )n their arrival I foimd them 
to be Lesser Diuca Mnches. As it happened, I already had an 
odd male of the larger species Diuca diuca, so I was able to 
compare the two species. The only difference that I could see 
was in the length of the flight and tail-feathers, which in the 
larger bird (D. diuca) appeared to be about ^ inch longer. The 
colour in both sexes is alike in both species, but the hen is a 
little more dingy. 
Early in May my pair of D. iiii)wr went to nest, building 
a rather untidy nest of grass and roots, to which they gave a 
thick lining of feathers. Three rather large eggs were laid, 
similar in type to some of our house sparrow's eggs, but the 
sliell was rather more glossy. On examining the 6ggs, after a 
week's incubation, I found that two of them had been punctured, 
so I removed the whole clutch. A few days afterwards they 
laid again in the same nest, and, after an incubation period of 
thirteen days, two young were hatched from the three eggs, 
'i'hese were ugly little things, but grew rapidly, as both parents 
fed them, and, as plenty of mealworms were available, every- 
thing was in their favour. On examining their nest about a 
fortnight later, I was surprised to find that they had flown, and 
