Bird Notes, Part 1, v658
Page 47
Image from the Biodiversity Heritage Library. Contributed by Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, University of California, Berkeley. | www.biodiversitylibrary.org
Transcription
(18) is a more graceful bird. I have looked at both of the birds repeatedly at close range, but have been unable to note any constant difference in color or markings at all. Somewhat later in the afternoon we went to the nest again. They were not working, but one bird came and ate soft-food from my hand. It was a little nervous, due I thought, to some bird's giving a danger call from the tree overhead. I assumed that it was the one that I have been calling the female (without warrant) and gave the matter no special attention, but after it had run down into the glade, it, or another bird, appeared in a tree on the other side of the glade and burst into short, full song. It thought it was the male--not the one I had been feeding; but Mr. Brock said that the latter was the male. I can distinguish one from the other by difference in eye color, tameness and by accidental differences, such as a short tail feather on one of them, but not on the other, as is the case at present. But which is male and which female, I do not know. After Mr. Brock left and it was getting about time for the birds to knock off work for the day, as shown by their actions, I induced them both to come to me at the same time and got a good look at them. There was no direct sunlight on their eyes, so those features could not be compared as to color. To me they looked exactly alike, but one is much more shy. I fed the tamer one and tried to keep track of both and when she retired, I induced the other to come closer, and, finally it ate soft-food from my hand. Now it may have been the same bird that Mr. Brock saw close to before, but if so, it was more timid than before. They were both in sight all of this time. They may have changed about without my noticing it, but I do not think that they did. The last bird had not taken soft food from me before and