Image from the Biodiversity Heritage Library.
Contributed by Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, University of California, Berkeley.
| www.biodiversitylibrary.org
Transcription
head end suddenly became very heavy and the club began to slide
off. Brownie was sitting on it waiting for worms! He made several
B and R. trips back and forth, thus attracting the attention of Rhody who
Intimidation?
was lying on the ground about 10 feet away. R came over for his
gesture by R.
share and made a half circle around B with his belly on the ground,
following with a few ground loops in the same posture. This is
a repetition of his action toward the pigeons noted herein. Perhaps
it is an intimidation gesture.
Earlier in the day, as we were having a late lunch, R was seen
outside with a very small lizard in his bill. A few minutes later
he was heard (and seen) running on the floor overhead. He had in-
vaded a bed-room and a bath room. He came down with the lizard and
then went up to the roof again with it. More than an hour after
he carried it to the cage where he, this time, added a piece of meat
to the burden. (Because the lizard was too small?). He admired
himself in the mirror with his new decorations without pecking his
reflection and then wandered off, but was not followed. Over an
hour after this I went in search of him and found him down on the
south bank still with the lizard and the meat. He greeted me with
two very soft hroos. He had carried the lizard for about two and
a half hours and the meat with it for more than an hour. Shortly
before 4 he came to the cage for meat which he ate at once. His
former burden had disappeared. During the carrying period he had
persistently wagged his tail horizontally in the new movement which,
so far, has only been seen when he has had one of his carrying
behaviors with "game" in his bill.
The addition of the meat to the lizard, irresistibly suggests
that the latter was not considered large enough for a suitable of-
fering either to a prospective mate or to nestlings. When he does
this carrying he seems to be hunting for some one to whom to give