82 TUBQU0I8INE. 
trees and shrubs alive, and if this can be done it adds very considerably 
to the attractiveness of the coup d’oeilj but unhappily, as a rule. Par- 
rots and Parrakeets have such an inveterate propensity for “whittling”, 
that it is almost impossible to get a plant of any kind to grow in 
any enclosure where they are kept. 
Still this can be done, as the following extract from a letter of one 
of our correspondents fully shows;— “My conservatory is large, and 
kept at, at least, temperate heat. The plants are Palms, Dracmnas, 
Tiee-Ferns, etc.; I have not found the plants injured except by 
Weavers, which I have discarded, and, strange to say, Turquoisines. 
My Budgerigars have done no harm whatever, but the Turquoisines 
compelled me to get rid of them (very reluctantly), from their nibbling 
the young leaves of an Euphorbia for which I gave twenty-five guineas, 
and from its being clear that they would practically spoil it, if I left 
them in the house.” 
Fiom the above it is apparent that trees and some birds are not 
incompatible, although our experience with Undulated Parrakeets is the 
reverse of that of our correspondent, wo have always found them most 
destructive to trees and shrubs, and this also is the record of M 
Leon Mary, from whose charming little boob. La Perruche OnduUe, 
wo shall have occasion to quote further on. 
In his interesting work on the Psittacidce, Mr. Gedney doubts whether 
such a bird as “The Blue-banded Grass Parrakeet” has any existence 
in fact, although described as a distinct species by several writers; 
we believe that it is neither more nor less than a Turquoisine in its 
brightest summer attire: but these vexed questions can only, as we 
have already remarked, be set at rest by careful observation of the 
birds under consideration from their cradle to their grave; and, lest 
confinement in a restricted area should mar the symmetry of 'their 
form, and the brilliance of their colouring, the aviary in which they 
are kept should be of the largest possible dimensions, well provided 
with trees and shrubs, which for convenience of replacing them when 
marred by the birds, should be planted in large pots; it should be 
well grassed too, and be provided, where practicable, with a constant 
supply of running water. 
Birds so situated, would, by their beauty and vivacity, quite surprise 
a spectator who had only been accustomed to see them pent up in a 
cage, where, too often, they have barely room to turn themselves round, 
and always look untidy, miserable, and dejected. 
