The Nests and Eggs of Indian Birds Part 54

Dr. Jerdon says:--"I found the nest in low jungle near Nellore, made chiefly of gra.s.s, with a few roots and fibres, globular, large, with a hole at one side near the top, and the eggs white, spotted very thickly with rusty red, especially at the thick end."

Mr. Blewitt appears to have taken many eggs of this species in the Raipoor District, and he has sent me the following notes, together with numerous eggs. He says:--

"The Jungle Wren-Warbler breeds in the Raipoor District from about the middle of June to the middle of August. Low thorn-bushes on rocky ground are chiefly selected for the nest, and both parent birds a.s.sist in building it and in hatching and rearing the young. A new nest is made each year, and four is the maximum number of eggs.

"On the 1st July this year I found a nest of this species in the centre of a low th.o.r.n.y bush, growing in rocky ground, about two miles north of Doongurgurh in the Raipoor District.

"The nest was about 4 feet from the ground, firmly attached to and supported by the branches. It was of a deep cup shape, 36 in diameter and 49 in height, composed of coa.r.s.er and finer gra.s.ses firmly interwoven, and contained four fresh eggs. In the same locality we secured a second similarly situated nest, about 2 feet from the ground, and it contained a single fresh egg. It was rather more neatly and ma.s.sively made than the former. It was about 4 inches in diameter and 5 inches in height, and the egg-cavity was nearly 3 inches deep.

The lining is of fine gra.s.s-stalks well interwoven. The exterior is composed of coa.r.s.e gra.s.s mixed with a little greyish-white fibre.

"Subsequently several other similar and similarly situated nests were found."

Colonel E.A. Butler writes:--"The Jungle Wren-Warbler breeds in the neighbourhood of Deesa in the months of July, August, and September.

The following are the dates upon which I found nests this year (1876):--

"July 28. A nest containing 4 young birds.

" 29. " 5 fresh eggs.

Aug. 1. " 4 "

" 5. " 5 "

Aug. 13. " 5 "

" 16. " 4 young birds fledged.

" 17. " 5 "

" " " 3 "

" 19. " 4 "

" " " 5 "

" 30. " 5 "

Sept. 3. " 5 "

"In addition to the above, I found nests in the same neighbourhood in 1875. One on the 14th August containing four young birds almost ready to leave the nest. It was placed in the middle of a tussock of coa.r.s.e gra.s.s on the side of a nullah on a bank overgrown with gra.s.s and bushes, and my attention was attracted first of all to the spot by the incessant chattering and uneasiness of the two old birds, one of which had a large gra.s.shopper in its mouth. After hiding behind a bush for a few minutes, I saw the hen bird fly to the nest, which led to its discovery. The nest was dome-shaped, with an entrance upon one side, composed exteriorly of blades of rather coa.r.s.e dry gra.s.s (green, however, as a rule when the nest is first built), and interiorly of similar, but finer, material. It is an easy nest to find when once the locality in which the birds breed is discovered, as it is a conspicuous ball of gra.s.s, smeared over, often more or less, exteriorly with a silky white vegetable-down or cobweb, and many of the blades of the tussock in which it is placed are often drawn down and woven into the nest, which at once attracts attention. Then, again, the c.o.c.k bird is almost always to be found on the top of some low tree near the nest, uttering his peculiar ventriloquistic note '_tissip, tissip, tissip_,' etc. All the above nests were exactly alike and in similar situations, viz. fixed in the centre of a tussock of coa.r.s.e gra.s.s on the banks of some deep nullahs running through a large gra.s.s 'Beerh.' The eggs remind me more of the English Robin's eggs than those of any other species I know. The ground-colour is dull white, sometimes tinted with pale green, and the markings reddish fawn. In some cases the eggs are peppered all over with a conspicuous zone at the large end, sometimes a dense cap instead of a zone. In other cases the markings, though always present, are almost invisible, as also the zone or cap. They are about the size of the eggs of the Spotted Flycatcher. I found a few other nests besides those I have mentioned during July and August 1875."

Captain c.o.c.k informed me that this species is "common in the jungles around Seetapore. Nest is largish, dome-shaped, and placed low down in a th.o.r.n.y bush. The bird lays in August five eggs, the _fac-simile_ of the eggs of _Pratincola ferrea_, perhaps of a more elongated type than the eggs of that bird."

Mr. H. Parker, writing on the birds of North-west Ceylon, refers to this bird under the t.i.tles _D. jerdoni_ and _D. valida_, and informs us that it breeds from January to May.

The eggs of this species are somewhat elongated ovals. The ground-colour is a greenish or greyish stone-colour, and they are finely and often rather spa.r.s.ely freckled all over with very faint reddish brown, or brownish pink in most eggs; these frecklings are gathered together into a more or less dense zone round the large end, forming a conspicuous ring there much darker-coloured than the frecklings over the rest of the surface. The eggs have a faint gloss.

In length they vary from 068 to 075, and in breadth from 049 to 052, but the average appears to be 07 by 05.

466. Prinia inornata, Sykes. _The Indian Wren-Warbler_.

Drymoipus inornatus (_Sykes_), _Jerd. B. Ind._ ii. p. 178; _Hume, Rough Draft N. & E._ no. 543.

Drymoipus longicaudatus (_Tick._), _Jerd. B. Ind._ ii, p. 180.

Drymoipus terricolor, _Hume_; _Hume, Rough Draft N, & E._ no. 543 bis.

The breeding-season of this Wren-Warbler commences with the first fall of rain, and lasts through July and August to quite the middle of September.

The birds construct a very elegant nest, always closely and compactly woven, of very fine blades, or strips of blades, of gra.s.s, in no nests exceeding one-twentieth of an inch in width, and in many of not above half this breadth. The gra.s.s is always used when fresh and green, so as to be easily woven in and out. Both parents work at the nest, clinging at first to the neighbouring stems of gra.s.s or twigs, and later to the nest itself, while they push the ends of the gra.s.s backwards and forwards in and out; in fact, they work very much like the Baya (_P. baya_), and the nest, though much smaller, is in texture very like that of this latter species, the great difference being that the Baya, with us, more often uses _stems_, and _Prinia_ strips of _blades_ of gra.s.s. The nest varies in shape and in size, according to its situation: a very favourite locality is in amongst clumps of the _sarpatta_, or serpent-gra.s.s, in which case the bird builds a long and purse-like nest, attached above and all round to the surrounding gra.s.s-stems, with a small entrance near the top. Such nests are often 8 or 9 inches in length, and 3 inches or even more in external diameter, and with an internal cavity measuring 1 inch in diameter, and having a depth of nearly 4 inches below the lower margin of the entrance-hole. At other times they are hung between bare twigs, often of some th.o.r.n.y bush, or are even placed in low herbaceous plants; in these cases they are usually nearly globular, with the entrance-hole near the top; they are then probably 3 inches in external diameter in every direction. In other cases they are hung to or between two or more leaves to which the birds attach the nest, much as a Tailor-bird would do, using, however, fine gra.s.s instead of cobwebs or cotton-wool for ligaments. I have never found more than five eggs in any nest, and four is certainly the normal number.

Mr. R.M. Adam remarks:--"I had a nest brought me in Oudh on the 17th April, containing four eggs. About Agra and Muttra, where as you know the birds are _very_ common, I have always obtained the greatest number of eggs during August; four is the regular number; in one taken on the 16th August I found five eggs."

Mr. W. Blewitt writes:--"During July, August, and the early part of September I found mult.i.tudes of nests of this species in the neighbourhood of Hausie, almost exclusively in the Dhasapoor, Dhana, and Secundapoor _Beerhs_ or jungle-preserves.

"The nests, of which numerous specimens were sent to you, were of the usual type, and were nearly all found in ber (_Z. jujuba_) and hinse (_Capparis aphylla_) bushes, at heights of from 3 to 4 feet from the ground. I did not meet with more than four eggs in any one nest."

Colonel E.A. Butler says:--"The Indian Wren-Warbler is very common in the plains, frequenting low scrub-jungle and long gra.s.s studied with low bushes (_Calotropis, Zizyphus_, &c.). It breeds during the monsoon, commencing to build in July, during which month and August in the neighbourhood of Deesa I must have examined some three or four dozen nests. There are two distinct types of nests, and there may be two species of this genus in this part of the country; but I must confess that after shooting a large number of specimens of both s.e.xes, and after examining an immense series of the eggs, I have failed to make out more than one species, and that Mr. Hume informs me is his _Drymoipus terricolor_. The nests alluded to vary as follows:--One type is very closely and compactly woven, as described of _D.

terricolor_ ('Nests and Eggs, Rough Draft,' p. 349), with the entrance almost at the top. The other type is built of the same material, with the exception that the gra.s.s is rather coa.r.s.er, but is more in shape like a Wren's nest, and the gra.s.s is somewhat loosely put together instead of being woven, and it has the entrance with a slight canopy over it upon one side. The eggs four, and not uncommonly five, in number, were exactly alike in both types, as also were the specimens of the birds themselves that I obtained.

"Nearly all the nests I have seen have been built on the outside of ber bushes (_Z. jujuba_), at heights varying from 2 to 5 feet from the ground."

Mr. B. Aitken says:--"I found this nest at Bombay on the 13th October, 1873, at the edge of a tank some 2 feet above the ground. I have found four or five precisely similar ones before, generally in similar situations. The nest was strongly attached to the stems and leaves of four herbaceous plants growing close together. In many cases the strips of gra.s.s had been pa.s.sed through and pierced the leaves. The nest is deep and purse-shaped; the sides were prolonged upwards, except in front where the entrance was, and joined above so as to form a canopy. The nest has no lining, and none of the nests of this species that I ever saw have ever had any lining. The whole nest inside and out is composed of fine strips of blades of gra.s.s interwoven. The eggs, five in number, varied much in size. In colour they were bright blue, most irregularly blotched with various shades of purplish brown: some of the blotches very large, some mere specks.

Each egg had also washed-out stains or blotches. The smaller eggs were by far the brighter.

"By reason of the roof and walls the entrance to the nest was at one side, but there was nothing that could be called a hole. The roof projected over the entrance, forming a porch.

"Six or eight nests which I have seen of this species were all over water. But the birds are by no means confined to marshy localities.

"Even in the middle of the rains the nests are invariably made of dry yellow gra.s.s.

"One nest found in Berar was in a babool bush, where of course there could have been no leaves pierced."

Mr. E. Aitken writes:--"I have found a good many nests in Bombay, and it breeds in Poona too. My notes only mention two nests with eggs, on the 22nd and 25th August, but I found some much later; and I am almost certain it begins to lay much earlier, if not actually at the beginning of the monsoon, like _Orthotomus_ and _Prinia_.

"It builds in gardens and cultivated fields, especially in the vicinity of water, and often among plants growing in water.

"The nest is very firmly attached to the twigs of some plant where long gra.s.s or other plants completely surround and conceal it. It is usually about 3 foot from the ground. It varies much in size and shape, some being much deeper than others, and some having the top open; others an entrance somewhat to one side.

"I have always found three or four eggs--bright blue, with large irregular purplish-brown blotches and no hair-lines. I should have said that the nest is a bag, very uniformly woven, of fine gra.s.s, and _never with any lining_--at any rate in none that I have ever found.

They never use the same nest twice, always building a fresh one even if you only rob without injuring the first. I think they have only one brood in the year, but, like _Orthotomus_ and _Prinia_, one or two nests are generally deserted or destroyed by some accident before they succeed in rearing a brood."

Major C.T. Bingham informs us that this Wren-Warbler is a common breeder both at Allahabad and at Delhi from March to September. Builds a neat bottle-shaped nest in clumps of surpat gra.s.s, of fine strips of the gra.s.s itself, which I have repeatedly watched the birds tearing off. The eggs are lovely little oval fragile sh.e.l.ls of a deep blue, blotched and speckled and covered with fine hair-like lines, chiefly at the large end, of a deep chocolate-brown.

The eggs are a moderately long, and generally a pretty perfect, oval, often pointed towards one end, sometimes globular, seldom, if ever, much elongated. The sh.e.l.l is fine and glossy, and comparatively thick and strong. The ground-colour is normally a beautiful pale greenish blue, most richly marked with various shades of deep chocolate and reddish brown. Nothing can exceed the beauty or variety of the markings, which are a combination of bold blotches, clouds, and spots, with delicate, intricately interwoven lines, recalling somewhat, but more elaborate and, I think, finer than, those of our early favourite--the Yellow Ammer. The markings are invariably most conspicuous at the large end, where there is very commonly a conspicuous confluent cap, and the delicate lines are almost without exception confined to the broader half of the egg.

Very commonly the smaller end of the egg is entirely spotless, and I have a beautiful specimen now before me in which the only markings consist of a ring of delicate lines round the large end. Some idea of the delicacy and intricacy of these lines may be formed when I mention that this zone is barely one tenth of an inch broad, and yet in a good light between twenty and thirty interlaced lines making up this zone may be counted.

The intricacy of the pattern is in some cases almost incredible, and, what with the remarkable character of the patterns and the rich and varying shades of their colours, these little eggs are, I think, amongst the most beautiful known.

Occasionally the ground-colour of the eggs, instead of being a bright greenish blue, is a pale, rather dull, olive-green, and still more rarely it is a clear pinkish white. These latter eggs are so rare that I have only seen six in about as many hundreds.

In size the eggs vary from 053 to 07 in length, and from 042 to 05 in breadth; but the average of one hundred and twenty eggs measured was 061 by 045.

467. Prinia jerdoni (Blyth). _The Southern Wren-Warbler_.

Drymoeca jerdoni (_Blyth_), _Hume, cat._ no. 544 ter.

Mr. Davison says:--"The Southern Wren-Warbler breeds chiefly on the slopes of the Nilgiris about the Badaga cultivation. The nest is entirely composed of fine gra.s.s, and is generally placed about 2 or 3 feet from the ground, either in a clump of long gra.s.s or attached to the branch of a small bush. It is often suspended, domed, and with the opening near the top. The eggs, generally three, are blue, spotted and lined with deep red-brown."