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1 
soon the cries of chicks being fed were heard in many places.. 
after this until about 1230 activity tapered off, and about 1400 
a new peak of feeding activity was noted. After this many actalos 
disappeared from the air and were apparently resting with their 
chicks for the rest of the day» Little tropicourd acoiviL.y occurs 
■ /Rafter 1930 hours* X noted an aduxt tropic biro, feeding i^s 
x —-'chick and the adult placed nis bxln with Lhe j.ood inside 
of the chicks gullet and slowly regurgitated semidigested food 
all the while the chick was calling incessantly. 'When the adult 
ceased to feed the chick, the chick continued begging, aiid call¬ 
ing more loudly. The chick was fully feathered. 
10 - 23-63 
Up early again to help Bill in his rat study and was busy 
weighing animals until(L215, and later before dinner helped him be, 
bait the traps. In the interim and when not occupied with the 
weighing I took mental notes on the birds and spent two hours 
up in the radar tower. I noted today that Tropicbird chicks 
were being fed as early as 08OO in the rat study area. This 
is the earliest I have yet seen, and other than a few birds 
flying the main amount of Tropicbird activity did not begin 
until close to 1000 this AM: After that it was sporadic for 
, , the rest of the day. From the Radar tower I noted Tropic- 
bird chicks beginning to exercise their wings. They clamber¬ 
ed out of their scayeola thickets into the open, and adults 
( Often as many as six ) would fly and ba ck-pedel in the air 
over the chick calling. The chick answered several times and 
flapped excitedly, butbthe several I watched failed to get 
airborne. However, yesterday Chief Reeves saw one take off 
and fly fo Apparently the first time. Nearly all of the tropic¬ 
bird chicks here are about ready to gp, and I expect that 
within the next month all will be fledged. 
I was impressed today by the vast amount of time that 
roosting Frigates and Red-footed Boobys spend in preening. One 
frigate that I watched from the tower today spent 27 of 35 
minutes at proofing today, and with the the 25x spotting scope 
I could see the hippoboscid ectoparasites flying about the *• 
bird as he preened, and reentering the plumage as soon as he 
stopped. The Red-foots spent a lot of time 11 grubbing " in their 
/‘"i feathers for (apparently)mallophagans. They were not en- j 
' s —^gaged in resuffling the plumage, or moving the feathers 
to make the barbs of the feathers repair damages received, 
rather were probing deep to the skin the way a xlea—ciu^en 
dog does: Some of the Red—foots and rriga^es give one 0:1au 
exact impression. Over the last few days I have taken care to 
note the numbers of shore birds which are here. There have 
been increases in the numbers of both plovers and ournstones 
/ 
