That Was My Only Attempt To Raid The Nest, And From That Time The
Birds Continued In Peaceful Possession Of
It, until it came into some
person's mind that this huge nest was detrimental to the tree, and was
the
Cause of its producing so little fruit compared with any other
tree, and the nest was accordingly pulled down, and the birds forsook
the place.
In the description in a former chapter of our old peach trees in their
blossoming time I mentioned the paroquets which occasionally visited
us but had their breeding-place some distance away. This bird was one
of the two common parrots of the district, the other larger species
being the Patagonian parrot, _Conarus patagonus_, the _Loro
barranquero_ or Cliff Parrot of the natives. In my early years this
bird was common on the treeless pampas extending for hundreds of miles
south of Buenos Ayres as well as in Patagonia, and bred in holes it
excavated in cliffs and steep banks at the side of lakes and rivers.
These breeding-sites were far south of my home, and I did not visit
them until my boyhood's days were over.
In winter these birds had a partial migration to the north: at that
season we were visited by flocks, and as a child it was a joy to me
when the resounding screams of the travelling parrots, heard in the
silence long before the birds became visible in the sky, announced
their approach. Then, when they appeared flying at a moderate height,
how strange and beautiful they looked, with long pointed wings and
long graduated tails, in their sombre green plumage touched with
yellow, blue, and crimson colour! How I longed for a nearer
acquaintance with these winter visitors and hoped they would settle on
our trees! Sometimes they did settle to rest, perhaps to spend half a
day or longer in the plantation; and sometimes, to my great happiness,
a flock would elect to remain with us for whole days and weeks,
feeding on the surrounding plain, coming at intervals to the trees
during the day, and at night to roost. I used to go out on my pony to
follow and watch the flock at feed, and wondered at their partiality
for the bitter-tasting seeds of the wild pumpkin. This plant, which
was abundant with us, produced an egg-shaped fruit about half the size
of an ostrich's egg, with a hard shell-like rind, but the birds with
their sharp iron-hard beaks would quickly break up the dry shell and
feast on the pips, scattering the seed-shells about till the ground
was whitened with them. When I approached the feeding flock on my pony
the birds would rise up and, flying to and at me, hover in a compact
crowd just above my head, almost deafening me with their angry
screams.
The smaller bird, the paroquet, which was about the size of a turtle-
dove, had a uniform rich green colour above and ashy-grey beneath,
and, like most parrots, it nested in trees. It is one of the most
social birds I know; it lives all the year round in communities and
builds huge nests of sticks near together as in a rookery, each nest
having accommodation for two or three to half-a-dozen pairs. Each pair
has an entrance and nest cavity of its own in the big structure.
The only breeding-place in our neighbourhood was in a grove or remains
of an ancient ruined plantation at an estancia house, about nine miles
from us, owned by an Englishman named Ramsdale. Here there was a
colony of about a couple of hundred birds, and the dozen or more trees
they had built on were laden with their great nests, each one
containing as much material as would have filled a cart.
Mr. Ramsdale was not our nearest English neighbour - the one to be
described in another chapter; nor was he a man we cared much about,
and his meagre establishment was not attractive, as his old slatternly
native housekeeper and the other servants were allowed to do just what
they liked. But he was English and a neighbour, and my parents made it
a point of paying him an occasional visit, and I always managed to go
with them - certainly not to see Mr. Ramsdale, who had nothing to say
to a shy little boy and whose hard red face looked the face of a hard
drinker. _My_ visits were to the paroquets exclusively. Oh, why,
thought I many and many a time, did not these dear green people come
over to us and have their happy village in our trees! Yet when I
visited them they didn't like it; no sooner would I run out to the
grove where the nests were than the place would be in an uproar. Out
and up they would rush, to unite in a flock and hover shrieking over
my head, and the commotion would last until I left them.
On our return late one afternoon in early spring from one of our rare
visits to Mr. Ramsdale, we witnessed a strange thing. The plain at
that place was covered with a dense growth of cardoon-thistle or wild
artichoke, and leaving the estancia house in our trap, we followed the
cattle tracks as there was no road on that side. About half-way home
we saw a troop of seven or eight deer in an open green space among the
big grey thistle-bushes, but instead of uttering their whistling
alarm-cry and making off at our approach they remained at the same
spot, although we passed within forty yards of them. The troop was
composed of two bucks engaged in a furious fight, and five or six does
walking round and round the two fighters. The bucks kept their heads
so low down that their noses were almost touching the ground, while
with their horns locked together they pushed violently, and from time
to time one would succeed in forcing the other ten or twenty feet
back.
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