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194 Foreign Finchcs in CaptivUv.
I had been without any Cut-throat Fiuches for some six or seven years,
possibh' longer, when in the summer of 1892, I made up uu* miud to try
breeding them in a large cage ; I therefore wrote to Mr. Abrahams for a pair
and turned them into a cage 34 inches high, 23 inches wide, and 25 inches
from front to back; in one corner I hung up a German Canary-cage and supplied
the birds ^\•ith hay, moss and co^^•-hair ; they soon set to work and built, the
hen la}-ing fiA'e eggs, upon which the pair took turns and hatched, on the
twelfth day, five young ones. I now supplied them dailj- with a small pot of
Abrahams' Insectivorous birds' food, upon which the)- fed the young ; when
the 3'oung birds were about half grown one was carried out dead, and now the
call began to be distinctl}- heard " chif, chit, chit:" when I first heard it I
feared that the parents had caught cold, it so closely resembled a bird's sneeze;
the birds went to nest in August and the young, two pairs, (nearly /esembling
their parents,) left the nest about the second week of September ; two or three
days later they were quite able to feed themselves, and as I fotind that they
disturbed their parents I took them awaj-.
Now occurred the most astonishing thing which I have ever noticed in
breeding' birds. Whereas most birds when relieved of their full-fledged 3?oung
seem to be rather pleased than otherwise, whilst the j'onng if plentifull}- supplied
with seed and soft food are utterly indifferent to the loss of their parents, I
found mjr Ribbon-Finches, both parents and 3'Oung perfectly frantic over the
separation for t^vo or three days, dashing wildly to and fro and calling repeatedly
to one another. After this the old birds again settled down, the hen this time
laying three eggs, hatching all and, when the nestlings were abont a week old,
again carrying out one dead. The two others, again a pair, left the nest in
the first week of November. On the morning of October 12th, one of the j'onng
hens of the first nest commenced to laj- and in the afternoon of the same clay,
the other hen from the same nest deposited an egg on the sand. I now
separated the pairs giving each a nesting-box; but, owing to their getting too
fat, and to the cold of the winter, I lost both these yoitng hens from egg-binding,
one of them having already deposited eight eggs in her nest. The third pair
prodticed from mj^ second nest were still living and in excellent health in
February, 1894.
Dr. Russ says of the Ribbon Finch :—Imported into Europe for longer than
a hundred years, beloved up to the present time. Already bred by Vieillot in
1790; in Germany by Dr. K. Bolle in 1859. More recently so abundantly bred
in Bird-rooms and breeding-cages, that the fledglings at times exceeded the im-
Thc Ribbon Finch. 195
ported birds. Aksf careless, in nest-boxes enclosed up to the flight passage*, or
some other cavity; onl}' of a little coarse building material, stalks, fibres, threads,
feathers and other things. Laying:—four to seven eggs. Duration 0/ incnbalion :—
twelve days. The male when he relieves the hen always brings a stalk in with
him. Nests at any time of year, many pairs five to six times, sometimes without
intermission throughout the j'ear. Ncstling-doivn sparse, bluish; waxy skinglands
white, later blackish blue. Young plumage almost like that of the adult
female, but paler, whitish-grey, not brownish ; young male already with the red
throat-ribbon and breast spot; beak dark-grey ; feet white-grey. Change of colour:
all the markings become more pronounced. Young female already capable of
nesting after two or three months. In the Bird-room a pair of Ribbon Finches
at the nesting-season make a tremendous disturbance; destroy many other nests,
before they nest in one of them ; it is advisable therefore only to breed them in
a cage. Peaceable as soon as incubation has commenced, also harmless and
sociable in the aviary. The}-- are among the best of cage-birds, yet numy a pair
in man}- broods throws the young out of the nest ; I suggest depriving young
pairs of their first laying; Dr. Stolker separated the male, but kept it in the
same room ; the female then brought up the young alone. Song a wonderful
humming with comical cnrtse3.-ing movements."
In the case of my pair when nesting, onlj' the odd young one was thrown
out of the nest, so that males and females in equal numbers were reared : but
whether this was designedly the case, or the young died a natural death, I could
not tell. One of the j'onng ones had been dead for some days before the parents
threw it out of the nest, but nevertheless it is possible that they may have killed
it.
Von Henglin, writing of the Ribbon Finch as observed in North-east Africa,
says:—"Observed by me during and after the rainy season up to December. In
September it assembles in little flocks and crowds about in the Steppes, quite
after the manner of Sparrows, particularl}' in the vicinity of the desert-streams,
where the birds delight in collecting upon isolated trees during the mid-day hours.
They also wander about in crowds in the tall grass, in hedges, gardens and
among the rocks and fragmentary stones of trampled down thickets. They also
like to descend to the earth and bathe in the sand."
Von Henglin also quotes Antinori's authority' for the fact that the Ribbon
Finch breeds in August and the beginning of September. " Song and behaviour
I I
* Presumably Cigar-boxes; liiuiii up perpendicularly, -witli the upper fourLli of the lid sawn off and the
other tliree-fourths nailed down. A.C..B.
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