SCAVENGER BIRDS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXVI, 30 November 1933, Page 10

SCAVENGER BIRDS

There lire vegetarians even among birds. We find .eaters of grain and fruit, of buds, nuts and leaves, of nectar and even of pollen. Lichens form a considerable iicnis in the menu of ptarmigans, the Arctic grouse. Such plants as the duck-weed and the partridgeberry bear the names of the birds whose partiality for them is so marked. jVorms form ail important part of the food of many birds. Thiushcs and woodcocks are particularly fond of them. A favourite morsel of the curious apteryx of New Zealand is a gigantic species of worm twelve to twenty inches in length, which is highly phosphorescent. Tiie apteryx seeks its lood by night, and when 'devouring one of these worms the whole bird is lighted up, and after ils meal the bird’s bill is illumined by the mucus which adheres to it. Fish-eating birds show remarkable ingenuity in their oiforts to obtain their favourite food. Among strenuous fish-er-birds is the osprey, hovering on slowly vibrating wings over some favourite .spot until a finny back shows itsclt near the surface, when, giving itself to gravitation. the bird drops unerringly on the luckless fish. White pelicans are the analogues of man’s gill-nets, a flock of these birds .surrounding a. school ol jjsb in a half-circle and driving them ashore or into shallow water. When in captivity many birds will eat food which in a natural state they would not touch. For greatest variety the burrowing owl takes a high place. It will not disdain vegetable food, and in its underground dining chambers have been found remains ol ducklings, sparvows, mice, and many small birds and i uiieut.-i, besides snakes and frogs, spid ( vs, beetles, and apparently all siVia)] forms of life which the little birds are able to catch and kill.