and Yellow Wagtails, which I believe were also these birds, but which were too wild to allow me to fully identify them by a nearer approach.—J. Steele Elliott (Dixon's Green, Dudley).
Avicultural Notes.—Canaries in my out-door aviary, at the autumn moult, had their yellow feathers almost obscured by long grey hairs; these are now shed, and they are their usual bright yellow colour, so that it would seem as if in the first year of turning out they revert back to nature in this respect also. Dr. Butler is clear, and I think evidently correct, in his article on Foreign Finches and their combative qualities in aviaries, notwithstanding some of our experiences may vary a little first one way or the other. In my own little experience, birds whose behaviour last year left nothing to be desired are this year quite pugnacious; therefore to be in a position to dogmatise one must, as Dr. Butler says in his opening statement, be an observer over a number of years.
I am much interested in the manner in which those birds whose summer and winter plumage is dissimilar assume their gaudy summer attire. In such birds as Chaffinches and other Fringillidæ, whose plumage, though the same, is yet much brighter during the breeding-season, the result is brought about by the abrasion or wearing away of the fluffy hairs produced in the autumn moult; but this is not the case with such birds as Weavers, &c. Now, in the case of two Black-faced Weavers which I have successfully wintered in my garden aviary, during this change I have noticed all over the head, shoulders, neck, and breast—the principal parts affected—spines were produced so thickly as to resemble moulting; but there certainly was no moult, save with a few of the larger primaries. Can these spines be colourglands? I much regretted that my aviary was so full, and with one or two pairs sitting it was not possible to catch them and make a close examination; but they are very tame, and by close observation I ascertained these facts. I shall certainly alter my arrangements and increase my specimens for next season, so as to ascertain fully and clearly the detail of the whole process. I believe myself that these spines (as I have called them) are produced in the quill of the existing feathers—visible, as before recorded, just before and while the change is taking place; and that these spines—or as I have called them colour-glands—bursting, the transformation is brought about, or else a new feather is almost produced on the old stem from these spines, and the whole matter shed and the change produced that way. I shall increase my specimens of Ploceidæ and extend my observations upon this interesting point. Will other fellow-aviarists do likewise, and I am sure much interesting and instructive data will be the result?— W.T. Page (6, Rylett Crescent, Shepherd's Bush, W.)
