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J. E. Sweetnam—Breeding the Painted Finch



I had better say here that my experience with the species is, so

far, limited to one adult pair, which I obtained last October. These

were privately imported, and were stated to have been themselves

aviary-bred in Australia.


As mentioned in some general notes I sent in at the end of last

year, this pair made an abortive attempt at breeding in an inside heated

aviary in November, after which the hen started moulting. By March

they were again in perfect condition and, that month, laid and incubated

six fertile eggs in an old canary bath, hung rather low down on the wall

of the same aviary—a converted attic with central heating run in from

the house, and with additional overhead lighting.


As all six youngsters were thrown out of the nest as soon as hatched,

I concluded the cock was in too high breeding condition to be trusted,

so I divided the next clutch of six eggs between two good pairs of

Bengalese in an outside unheated aviary. They hatched all six, of which

five flew on 1st June. Of these five I lost one when the foster parents

went to nest again and somewhat neglected its feeding. In the mean¬

time, the pair of Painted Pinches had gone to nest again in the same

place as before and, this time, successfully reared the three young to

maturity—thus making a total of seven young reared to maturity

from one pair within six months. At the moment of writing this obliging

pair of birds are again sitting on either five or six eggs, which I intend

to transfer again to Bengalese, in the expectation that the parents will

continue to oblige with another clutch within ten days or so, and

that I may repeat the original performance !


If this pair of mine can be taken as representative of the species,

it should not be long before this delightfully sociable and, in my

experience, hardy and prolific bird has its place in the aviaries of many

of our members.


Now for some details to supplement the scrappy and rather con¬

tradictory information so far available :—


Period of Incubation. —As, on each occasion, incubation commenced

after the laying of the second egg and, consequently, the young were

hatched out on successive days, it is difficult to be certain on this

point, but I make the time fifteen days from the laying of the first egg.


Nesting and Incubating. —So far as my observation goes, the cock



