36



J. Delacour—Bird Notes from Cleres for 1932



a smaller one, so as to give the first named a better chance to bree

next season.


The Rheinart’s had no luck this year : the first two clutches were

smashed ; only one egg each of the other two clutches was fertile and

hatched, but one chick was killed by the broody hen ; the other one

was growing well when, at three weeks old, it died in a few days of some

sort of roup, to which this species is particularly susceptible. The old

pair are magnificent. The long tail-feathers of the cock reached

1-73 m. this year, a length that I have never recorded before in wild

specimens, the average being 1*50 m.


My hen Argus laid many eggs but, the male having an injured foot,

they proved infertile. I have now obtained some perfect birds.


Before leaving the subject of game birds, I have something to say

about the Australian Brush Turkeys. For two years I had been

keeping these birds in large pens with poor results. I started with

two cocks and four hens. Soon each cock killed a hen and last year,

through some keeper’s neglect, one male went into the next aviary

and killed the other one. Mounds had been built every year with

suitable materials provided, but no chicks ever came out. Being left

last spring with one cock and two hens, I decided in April to pinion

them and let them out in the park, feeling rather tired of them. It

took them about a month to settle down, but they soon became tame

enough. The male chose a small flat piece of ground in a sloping wood

high up on the hill, and built a fine mound, which he kept up beautifully

till the end of October, changing its shape every day. Only one hen

was allowed to come near, and I am convinced that these birds are

strictly monogamous, as it was already found out in France some fifty

years ago, when they were bred in numbers in a wild state on an estate

not far from Paris. Unfortunately the work had started too late.

The first chicks came out in the middle of September and eight in all

were seen, with a difference of nine or ten days between each of them.

The first two were fully reared without any special food or care, but the

season was too much advanced for the others, and we found them

dead after a few days. We caught the last one, late in October, and

it did quite well indoors for three weeks when it died, apparently

poisoned.



