It is an arboreal bird, but not quite so exclusively as the Ring-tail.
Like the Bald-pate, he is often shot, by forestalling him at his
feeding tree, before day-break. In form he agrees with the bird just
named; his legs and feet are stout and strong; his head and neck
small and slender; the plumage of his nape forms a sort of ridge. M.
Temminck, probably having never seen the bird alive, and not being
aware of the very singular peculiarity of the iris mentioned in the
note, has given his figure red eyes. The two colours impart a very
unusual character to the physiognomy of the species; it is constant,
not accidental.
About the end of April, I was informed of a Blue Pigeon’s nest on a
lofty limb of an inaccessible cotton tree. It was a more substantial
structure than those of its congeners, being made of dried grass,
or similar material, as well as twigs. A Bald-pate had a nest on
a contiguous tree, and the neighbouring birds were continually
squabbling. I have never seen the eggs.
The Blue Pigeon is said to inhabit not only all the great islands of
the West Indies, but also Guiana.
BALD-PATE.[87]
(_White-crowned Pigeon._ +Bon.+)
_Columba leucocephala._ +Linn.+
Aud. pl. 177.
[87] Length 16 inches, expanse 23¹⁄₂, flexure 7³⁄₄, tail 5¹⁄₂,
rictus 1¹⁄₄, tarsus 1¹⁄₁₀, middle toe 2¹⁄₂. Irides cream-white;
eyelids purplish flesh colour.
This fine dove is common in almost all situations, but chiefly affects
the groves of pimento, which generally adorn the mountain pens. The
sweet aromatic berries afford him abundant and delicious food during
the pimento season; the umbrageous trees afford him a concealment
suited to his shy and suspicious character; and on them his mate
prefers to build her rude platform-nest, and rear her tender progeny.
Wary exceedingly, the Bald-pate, from his seat among the topmost twigs,
discerns the gunner, himself unseen, and intimates his vicinity only
by the rushing of his strong wings, as he shoots off to some distant
part of the grove. In the breeding season, however, when alarmed from
the nesting tree, he does not fly far, and soon returns; so that the
sportsman, by concealing himself, and watching the bird’s return, may
bring him down. When the pimento is out of season, he seeks other
food; the berries of the sweetwood, the larger ones of the breadnut,
and burn-wood, of the bastard cedar, and the fig, and the little ruddy
clusters of the fiddle-wood, attract him. He feeds early in the
morning, and late in the afternoon: large numbers resort to a single
tree, (though not strictly gregarious,) and when this is observed, the
sportsman, by going thither before dawn, and lying in wait, may shoot
them one by one, as they arrive. In September and October they are
in fine condition, often exceedingly fat and juicy, and of exquisite
flavour. In March the clammy-cherry displays its showy scarlet racemes,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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