9 ° 
PICARIAN BIRDS. 
noiseless flight much resembles that of goatsuckers; but in descending rapidly the 
wings are frequently raised and held together in a point. Their principal food 
consists of the fruit of the nectandra trees; these fruits being seized by the birds 
while in full flight from the tips of the slender boughs which would be too frail to 
bear the weight of the robbers. For seizing such fruits the hooked and powerful 
bill of the oil-bird is most admirably adapted. The rapidity with which the 
guacharos feed is remarkable; two specimens killed by Stolzmann early one 
evening having their crops empty, whereas one shot a quarter of an hour later had 
swallowed seven fruits, and a second bagged after another quarter of an hour no 
less than eleven. The same observer remarks that it would be curious to know 
what the birds did for the remainder of the night, after having satisfied their 
appetite, for he has seen them in moonlight evenings on the wing as late as eleven. 
The note of the guacharo is harsh and disagreeable, and has been compared to the 
syllables cri-cri-cirri ; although there is another cry which cannot be rendered in 
words. From observations on a young bird, in the grey nestling plumage, Stolz¬ 
mann found that the large nectandra stones are regurgitated after the fleshy 
covering has been digested. This rejecting process is accomplished without any 
apparent effort on the part of the bird; a slight movement of the feathers of the 
throat takes place, the beak opens gently, and the stone appears; while, if any of 
the fleshy covering still adheres to it, the bird picks it off. The old birds appar¬ 
ently cast up the stones during flight; and although no insects were found in the 
stomachs of the specimens shot, Stolzmann is of opinion that guacharos are partly 
insectivorous. Humboldt and Bonpland visited the celebrated cavern of Caripe, 
from whence these birds take their specific name; and the following account of the 
visit is taken from a biographical work. “ The Indians,” it is written, “ showed 
the travellers the nests of the guacharos by fixing a torch to a long pole. These 
nests were fifty or sixty feet high above their heads, in holes in the shape of 
funnels, with which the roof of the grotto was pierced like a sieve. The noise 
increased as the travellers advanced, and the birds were scared by the light of the 
torches. When this noise ceased for a few minutes, around them they heard at a 
distance the plaintive cry of the birds roosting in other ramifications of the cavern : 
and it seemed as if different groups answered each other alternately. The Indians 
were in the habit of entering this cavern once a year, near midsummer; when they 
went armed with poles, with which they destroyed the greater part of the nests. 
At that season several thousand birds were killed; and the old ones, as if to defend 
their brood, hovered over the heads of the Indians, uttering terrible cries. The 
young, which fell to the ground, were opened on the spot for their fat. At the 
period commonly called at Caripe the oil-harvest, the Indians built huts with palm 
leaves near the entrance, and even in the porch of the cavern. There, with a fire 
of brushwood, they melted in pots of clay the fat of the young birds just killed; 
this fat being known by the name of guacharo-butter.” The nest is formed of 
clay; and the eggs, varying from two to four in number, have a thick shell, which 
is at first chalky white, but by contact with the nest becomes yellowish green. 
R. BOWDLER SHARPE. 
