Museum Notes BIRDS IN WINTER

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22435, 23 June 1938, Page 2 (Supplement)

Museum Notes BIRDS IN WINTER

Now mid-winter day has come it will be noticed that birds are busy seeking food in the most suitable places they can find. They have been compelled to desert the high country which is now under snow. Flocks of finches and other small introduced birds have left the back country and, in their search

for seeds, have had to come mtp city and suburban gardens, where, a few lingering flowers are still to be found, and a fair assortment of weeds in the shelter of hedges and f6HC6S Of the native bush birds that depend on fruit and insects, rather than on seeds, waxeyes are the most abundant, and small flocks of these cheerful little birds are to be seen daily in any park or gardens

(By R. A. Falla)

in Christchurch, and no doubt any other towns as well. It is still too early for most birds to prepare for nesting. Indeed, August is considered to be one of the hardest months for them, and it will not, be much before September before nests are found. One or two are early nesters and song thrushefe may already be heard in preparation.

Only among the great, albatrosses oh sub-Antarctic islands is a long nesting season still in progress, and the large downy young are being fed at intervals of a few days by a curious process. Partly digested food in liquid form is passed from the throat of the parent into that of the chick. The chick puts its bill, slightly open, into that of its parent in such a way that the two bills form a cross.