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Transcription
spots generally not plentiful except about zone if one is
present. Incubation about 8 to 11 days I believe.
(SEE ALSO NOTES SPEC. SPECIES AND ZONES BIRDLIFE.)
MAYR QUESTION: Habitat. Forest (?)
ANSWER: Only margins unless coconuts are
present when it will be found in them and forest close about.
An almost invariable rule.
Food "Insects and nectar (?). Both in about a
60-40 per cent ratio on Uvea. Nectar is invariably vomited
on shooting and can only be traced in the stomach by tasting
with the tongue, though large drops of it often come out on
feathers. If shot against the sun a glint of light may be
seen on the shower of drops and sometimes even a jet of
nectar as it is vomited at the second of shot impact. I have
seen birds often vomit when suddenly frightened either by
being suddenly attacked by another Lichmera or by a hawk
passing overhead or by the sudden impact of an arrow or
stone alongside it. I once had a spot of this fall on my
hand and several times on my face or clothes, and on tasting
it was definitely nectar. (Once it was not nectar, but I
didn't tast it that time as it was easily classified). Doubt-
less insects attracted to the nectar and in it are also eaten,
but as stated, the species eats numberless other kinds of
insects providing they are small, evidently because of the
tiny stomach the species has. I am not sure whether it is
an insect eater which has turned to nectar eating, or a nectar
eater turned to insect eating, but think it is the latter.
Probably another case of "hurricane area" bird economics.
Hurricanes destroy all the flowers and vegetation which does