S. Porter—A West Indian Diary



69



give an adequate notion of the lustrous radiance of this most lovely

bird.” It is certainly one of the most beautiful of all known Pigeons

and after the wonderful Long-tailed Humming Bird, can truly be called

the loveliest of Jamaican birds. Even a hundred years ago it was

spoken of as rare and to-day in the mountainous districts the natives

if spoken to about it will say, “ All gone, never come no more,” and

most of the residents of Jamaica who are interested in birds admit

that it is the rarest of all the birds on the island.


Never common, the native shooters and the imported mongoose

have reduced it to a dying remnant. I only hope that the birds I

brought back will prove easy breeders and the race, in captivity at

least, will be perpetuated. Several of the birds I purchased were

avairy bred from the first original pairs which my friend in Jamaica

procured. According to various people with whom I spoke this

bird inhabits the most obscure and densely wooded mountains, where

it lives mainly on the ground searching for fallen berries and seeds

which form its food. The bird nests on the ground, usually at the base

of some forest tree. This, of course, had fatal results where the mongoose

had penetrated the districts where the birds were found.


I was told that it was necessary to provide the birds when in captivity

with a box on the ground with fairly high sides when nesting, for on

the slightest disturbance the' young will rush out of the nest and hide

in the vegetation or obscure corners. This confirms the statement of

Gosse that “ the Mountain Witch lays in March in the angle of the roots

of a tree on the ground ; that the young leave the nest about a week

after they are hatched and are led about by the mother who scratches

for them in the manner of a fowl.”


Several people mentioned to me the scratching habit of this

bird. It is strange to think of a pigeon, scratching in the ground but

no stranger than the Cyanoramphus Parrakeets which have the same

habit. In captivity the birds have a very strange habit of squatting

down on the ground with the breast touching the earth and the tail

pointing upwards at a greater height than the head ; the full chestnut

marked under tail-coverts are relaxed and turned towards the observer

so that all one sees of the birds is the spread out under tail-coverts.

This is without a doubt a protective action when the bird is resting on



