ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY 
BULLETIN 
Published by the New York Zoological Society 
Volume XXV JULY, 1922 Number 4 
THE FIRST HOATZINS IN CAPTIVITY* 
By William Beebe 
O N March 27 of the present year, I sent 
John Tee-Van to the Berbice River on 
the coast of Guiana, eighty miles due east 
of Kartabo, to find whether the Hoatzins were 
breeding. The seasons are so variable and the 
local information so indefinite that direct in¬ 
vestigation is the only certain method. This 
year we had two objects in view, in connection 
with these intensely interesting birds, the se¬ 
curing of moving pictures of the quadrupedal 
nestlings, and the capturing of living birds for 
the Zoological Park. Mr. Tee-Van was for¬ 
tunate enough to accomplish both and should be 
given full credit for the entire achievement. 
It is a remarkable fact that, although Hoat¬ 
zins are by far the most spectacular birds living 
on the earth to-day, nearest in many ways to 
their reptilian ancestors, yet no zoological park 
has ever possessed a specimen, this in spite of 
the fact that they are birds of weak flight, and 
occasionally live and nest fairly within the lim¬ 
its of man’s settlements. They are, however, 
confined to the dense growths along muddy tidal 
zones and swampy creeks, and are therefore 
extremely difficult to reach. Their food, too—- 
the harsh leaves of the mucka-mueka arums and 
thorn trees—would seem hard to replace with 
a more sophisticated diet. Our birds were 
caught at earliest dawn when still asleep, by 
an East Indian coolie fisherman, who crept up 
and threw a circular shrimp net over them. 
I have described these birds and their habits 
several times.f To repeat in brief, their domi¬ 
nant interest is the fact that the wings of the 
nestlings are armed with two well-developed 
claws, and the young birds clamber about the 
branches in a reptilian, but wholly unbirdlike 
manner. The power of flight of the full-grown 
birds is very weak, owing to the encroachment 
upon the muscles and their wing attachment by 
the huge crop, which is needed to grind up their 
coarse, leafy food. 
We had no idea how they would adapt them¬ 
selves to confinement, but instead of a long 
period of constant alarm and thrashing about, 
they settled down at once in apparent content¬ 
ment within a cage six by five, by five feet in 
height. Even when one of us entered with bun¬ 
dles of food-leaves, the alarm of the birds 
quickly subsided and within ten days they would 
hop to the nearest perch and begin to feed while 
we looked in through the open door, only a few 
feet away. When given a choice between mucka- 
mueka and wild caladium, they chose the latter, 
and of these they preferred the red- to the 
white-spotted. With cabbage and lettuce avail¬ 
able, the caladiums were still eaten in prefer¬ 
ence, but when the latter was reduced in amount, 
the first hints of hunger broke down all re¬ 
straint, and the lettuce and cabbage leaves were 
taken freely. One hoatzin was seen even to 
feed from a head of cabbage lying on the 
ground. 
During the first few days they frequently 
uttered their creaking, hissing call, but after 
becoming accustomed to their surroundings they 
were silent. They now preen their plumage, 
^Tropical Research Station, Contribution No. 117. 
fl909—Ecology of the Hoatzin, Zoologica, I. No. 
2, pp. 45-66. 
1910—Our Search for a Wilderness, pp. 26-29, 350, 
365-375. 
1917—Further Notes on the Life History of the 
Hoatzin, Tropical Wild Life, pp. 155-182. 
1919—Jungle Peace, Chapter V, A Hunt for Hoat¬ 
zins, pp. 92-122; Chapter VI, Hoatzins at Home, 
pp. 123-139. 
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