250 
ALBINO CUCKOOS AND OTHER CUCKOO NOTES. 
H. B. BOOTH. 
There is evidently a strain of albinism in one or more of the 
Cuckoos that annually visit the Embsay and Eastby Moors, 
although no adult Cuckoo has been seen with any extra white 
on it. In all, in four years, there have been four young albino 
Cuckoos — no mean record for any district. The first I reported 
in my annual West Riding Ornithological Report for 1929 
(Nat., 1930, p. 79). This bird is preserved and is in the 
Craven Museum at Skipton. It is a most beautiful bird, being 
immaculately white. It is worth any bird lover’s while to 
see it if in that town, though, unfortunately, excepting by 
arrangement, this museum is only open to the public from 
2-30 p.m. to 4-30 p.m. 
The following year another white young Cuckoo appeared 
on these moors, which are really a fringe of Barden Moor 
that hangs over into Airedale. I was informed that the Duke 
of Devonshire (who had seen the bird in the Craven Museum) 
gave instructions that this bird had not to be shot, and it 
apparently left the district in good health but did not 
return. 
On July 20th of this year I received a letter from Mr. 
F. J. N. Dufty, of Skipton, informing me that there were two 
young white Cuckoos on the same moors, and that if I would 
go up to Grouse Cottage there, the gamekeeper (Mr. Stewart) 
would be able to show them to me. On the following Sunday 
(July 23rd) I made my way up, but, unfortunately, was too 
late. Mr. Stewart had caught one of these birds asleep 
on the bracken in the evening, and had taken it home, where 
it was not caged, but had the full run of his kitchen for nine 
days. It became very tame, and would sit on their fingers 
and take caterpillars from their hands. It kept the game- 
keeper’s young children busy almost all the day in hunting 
for caterpillars to feed it. Mr. Stewart told me that it was 
pure white with pink eyes, and he thought that it had defective 
sight because it often missed the caterpillar on a plate or 
between the fingers with the first peck. Four days before 
I arrived some one had left the kitchen door open and the 
Cuckoo disappeared and was not seen again. After having 
been pampered and fed it would probably die a natural 
death from starvation, but let us hope not. 
Nor were we able to find the other white youngster some 
few hundred yards away. Mr. Stewart said it was a larger 
and more robust — and probably an older — bird than the one 
he had caught. 
There were quite a number of people from Embsay and 
The Naturalist 
