IN TOUCH WITH NATURE

Otago Witness, Issue 4039, 11 August 1931, Page 5

IN TOUCH WITH NATURE

BIRDS’ NESTS HAVE LASTING INTEREST.

By

J. Drummond,

F.L.S., F.Z.S.

V eln K altogether like Oliver endell Holmes, who confessed that he would rather laugh a bright-haired boy, than rule a grey-beard king, a man, when o!d, may retain some of the joys of boyhood. Alost boys are fascinated by a cosy, warm, compact nest, with a clutch of pretty eggs inside. The fascination continues into old age, only it is based then on something more than boyish curiosity. ■Lba subject is no longer bird-nesting, but nidihcation and the wonder is deeper when the skill shown by nest-builders is better known and the boundless variety of nests is realised, some birds following elaborate ai chitectural principles, some scampin" the work some usurpingly taking nests built by others.

Air T. Al'Gill, who writes from Langley, Kakaia, has retained all the interest in nests that caused him to roam forests in Otago when he was a boy. He states that ne has almost lived with many species ofe. native birds, and that he has met them in strange homes. A morepork owl usually a hole in the trunk of a tree quite suitable, or it may use a hollow in a rock, x? e c *} se , it is a lodger in the forests Mr Al Gill knew one in Alarlborough, that lived in an old buggy shed. Close by a kingfisher tucked its head under its win l * on the branch of a willow. The kingfisher s mate sat in a nest in a hole lower down the trunk. The owl apparently waited until dark, and then raided the kingfisher’s home, in which probably there were young kingfishers. The result was a duel and a double fatality. The following morning, both owl and kingfisher were found dead. The kingfisher had driven his sharp bill into the owl’s body, but the owl had closed its claws on the kingfisher’s throat and strangled it.

The South Island tomtit favours moss, spiderwebs, and decayed wood for its nest, somewhat spreading in foundation, but with a neat cup in the centre. At Alontrose, North Canterbury, Mr Al'Gill saw a pair of tomtits carrying fowls’ feathers, which they worked into a nest in a nikau palm used by them for winter quarters. He finds that, in some instances, individual birds like particular trees. At Parnassus, he knew a black shag that roosted in a poplar tree, making its home there for several months. At Langley, he often flushes 30 or 40 goldfinches that shelter in a tarata, or lemonwood tree. Further down the plantation he hears greenfinches in a pinus insignis every morning, but can discover nothing to show why that tree should be favoured above others.

The harrier-hawk, which, he reports, is increasing, likes a particular site in swampy ground, or in a ferny place. It is an early' riser. Air Al'Gill and a mate spent a night on Lake Waihola, Otago, drifting in a boat in a snowstorm until 3 a.m. i’he most vivid impression of his experience is the pukekos that roosted on mggerheads in shallow water. He states that the introduced yellowhammer, in its cloth of gold, often, especially in the winter, selects a dry bullrush swamp for its home: but to small birds, such as songthrushes, blackbirds, hedge sparrows, greenfinches, and white-eyes, gorse and broom are, perhaps, the friendliest plants in New Zealand. On Leslie Hills, North Canterbury, Air Al'Gill has seen what he describes as probably the largest roosting place of starlings in New Zealand. About 4 p.m. they arrive in thousands, making almost a deafening noise, not unlike, in character, the voice of many waters in a small waterfall.

Last spring, song-thrushes, goldfinches, chaffinches, white-eyes, and grey warblers made their nests in an isolated clump of tea-tree, about 10 yards bv 20 yaids iu area and eight feet high, left as a shelter Mr J; H. James’s residence Saies. Whangaroa county, North Auckland, lhe grey warblers’ nest was interesting on account of the fact that the builders worked into it hair that had been cut trom a man’s head. The nest was completed about the middle of October. Looking into it for the first time Air James was surprised to see in it a young cuckoo. On December 7 the usurper left the nest, but was caught and was placed in a warm cage in the tea-tree. The grey warblers, as foster-parents, fed it regularly. When any person went near its cage it became agitated and beat its wings against the wires. They grey warblers were seen feeding it on the evening of December 12. On the following morning it was found dead. An examination showed that it was plumn and it looked healthy. Air James thinks that it may have pined in captivity.

At the same time he had another young cuckoo under observation in a teatree that fringes the bank of a creek. It was seen first on December 1; its foster parents were seen feeding it on December 21; during the time "of observation it did not move more than two chains from where it was first seen. All this time the characteristic notes of an adult cuckoo were heard almost daily, for the last time on December 26. These observations lead Air James to think that the grey warblers’ eggs or young are removed from a nest by the adult cuckoo that places its own egg inside, that the adult waits until the young cuckoo is reared by the grey warblers, and that the adult then joins the young cuckoo and moves off to wherever its fancy dictates.

One of the simplest nests is the wood pigeon’s. Its very simplicity gives the eggs and the young more protection than is given by the elaborate nests of some birds. _ These nests are conspicuous, are easily discovered by enemies and often are raided. A wood pigeon’s nest is made of sticks loosely put together in the fork of a tree about 20 feet from the ground. It is merely a rough platform, with a slight depression in the centre, in which eggs and young He undisturbed by the swaying caused by winds, and usually unnoticed, especially by people who pass

by underneath. Wood pigeons all the world over seem to build on the same plan, so much so that there is an ancient nest’**’ Who has seen the wood pigeon’s

Still, Mr T. H. Potts, of Governor’s Lyttelton Harbour, who was fascinated by birds’ nests until he died at the age of 64 years, and who studied the nidification of scores of native birds, stated that the materials of the slight structure, which seem to be put together rudely and carelessly, are adjusted so nicely that they bear the big, heavy woodPigeon s weight with absolute safety. Wood-pigeon’s often change their quarters. To this he attributes the fact that their nests are not often seen. A better explanation is their inconspicuousness. A person may stand under a tree anl look long at a wood-pigeon’s nest, but never see it.

An, English ornithologist states that birds eggs laid in holes usually are wffiite, haxe few marks, because, as thev are hidden, it does not matter how' conspicuous they are; eggs laid on the bare ground without concealment often are covered with spots, blotches, patches, or stripes, lhese protective colour schemes make the eggs difficult to see. The brown-mh-yellow- eggs of the dotterel, spotted and blotched with black, resting in a very slight structure, are in this class. The black stilt’s yellowish-brown eggs, all spotted with blackish-brown, are another example. Terns’-*ggs, often laid on bare rock, without anj' protection whatever,' are amongst the richest in colour in New Zealand.

The brilliant scarlet-capped fly-agaric, which fascinates Aliss Lucy N. Robson at Pirongia, Waikato, i 9 reported by Sir R. Heaton Rhodes to be present at his residence, Otahuna. Tai Tapu, near Christchurch. He writes: “It appeared here three summers ago in a mixed plantation, chiefly oaks'and birches, on the borders of the garden. It came -up in groups or colonies, one group appearing where my sister wrns sketching, and making a very charming addition to the foreground of her picture. Though acquainted with this fungus in England, I had not seen it previously in this country. Being anxious to learn its name I took a specimen to the Agricultural Department in Wellington, and to the Forestry Department, but I failed to ascertain its specific name. There were larger and more groups last year and again this year; they were very beautiful last year, but this year they quickly dried up in the long drought.”