The restless and active members of this Family are generally seen in small flocks in wooded country, gardens, orchards, and hedge-rows. They are found up to an altitude of ten thousand feet throughout the Ethiopian, Indian, and Australian Regions, and even reach Amurland; Graucalus inhabits all three Regions, but Oxynotus is peculiar to Mauritius and Réunion. The flight is easy, undulating, and strong, though of brief duration; while the birds hop and frisk about the branches, or move briskly from tree to tree, as they examine the crevices of the bark or the leaves, and occasionally pluck the fruit. They may occasionally be noticed darting to the earth to secure caterpillars, of which they are extremely fond, or sallying into the air after insects, like Flycatchers. Pericrocotus is said to hang to the boughs like a Tit; Pteropodocys lives chiefly on the ground. The mellow and lively notes are of a whistling or twittering nature, varied by jarring sounds; but all the species are rather silent. The nest, composed of twigs and grass, or of moss and leaves, is usually very shallow, and is covered with lichens and spiders' webs; it is placed on slender branches of trees, or more rarely in bushes. The two to five Shrike-like eggs are brownish, whitish, or apple-green, with markings of brown, rufous, or purple. Those of the isabelline-coloured Hypocolius ampelinus, which possibly belongs to the Ampelidae, are white with plumbeous spots.
Fig. 116.–Grey "Coly-Shrike." Hypocolius ampelinus. × 5⁄12. (From Nature.)
Fam. XIII. Dicruridae.–The Drongos, usually associated with the Laniidae, range throughout the Ethiopian, Indian, and Australian regions, as far east as New Britain and New Ireland (Dicranostreptus). Chibia bracteata is the only species in Australia, while Buchanga leucogenys is said to reach Japan; B. waldeni is peculiar to Mayotte, and Edolius forficatus to Madagascar and Joanna Island. Both sexes are typically black, with a metallic gloss of blue, purple, or green, though a few are greyer or browner, or have a little white below. The variable bill is usually large and more or less curved, with a hooked tip, a notched maxilla, and fairly strong rictal bristles–much developed in Chaetorhynchus. The metatarsi are short, the toes small, the wings long. The tail has only ten rectrices, and is generally very deeply forked, though less so in Dicrurus, Chibia, and Chaetorhynchus. In Chibia the two outer feathers are slightly elongated and turned up, in Dissemuroïdes they are produced and recurved at the tip, in Dicranostreptus they are extraordinarily lengthened and turned to face one another. In Bhringa and Dissemurus the long bare shafts terminate in racquets, and have a twist that brings the upper side inwards in the former, and one in the racquet itself in the latter. On the forehead a large, erect tuft occurs in Edolius, a still more extensive recurved crest in Dissemurus, a bunch of long, silky hairs in Chibia hottentotta. A few similar hairs are found in C. pectoralis, and scanty plumes in C. bimaënsis; Dissemuroïdes having the one or the other. Various species exhibit a tendency to lanceolate hackles on the head and neck, while the feathers of the former are scaly-looking in Chaetorhynchus. The bill and feet are black; the eyes red, white, or brown.
Fig. 117.–Drongo. Dissemurus paradiseus. × 2⁄9.
These wary, active birds frequent gardens, open country, and forests up to at least eight thousand feet, more usually in pairs than in companies; their flight is strong and rapid, but undulating and not sustained, while they are often seen perched on bushes or exposed branches, and occasionally hover like a Kestrel. The song or whistle is ringing and melodious, varied by harsh chattering or creaking sounds; the food consists of insects of all kinds, which are captured on the ground, on leaves or flowers, on the backs of cattle, or at times upon the wing, individuals often returning to their perches like Flycatchers. Drongos are good mimics, fight viciously, and are very courageous, mastering even Hawks and Crows. The nest is a shallow cup of twigs, roots, leaves, fine grass, lichens, hair, and cobwebs, often so slight that the contents can be seen from below: it is usually woven into a horizontal fork like that of an Oriole, but may be fixed among bamboos, and often overhangs water. The eggs, rarely more than three or four in number, are sometimes plain white, but usually pink, buff, or white, with red, brown, claret, purplish, or grey spots and blotches. Not uncommonly a second set is found in a nest whence the first has been taken. A curious instance of "unconscious mimicry" is that of Buchanga atra and the Indian Cuckoo Surniculus dicruroïdes, the plumage being exactly the same, though the feet distinguish them at once.
Fam. XIV. Ampelidae.–In this group most forms have a short, depressed bill, though it is longer with bristly gape in Phaenoptila, and stouter in Dulus; they have abbreviated metatarsi, not scutellated in Phaenoptila; the wings are long and pointed in Ampelis, shorter and roundish elsewhere; the tails vary from short and even in Ampelis to long and rounded in Phaenopepla, or cuneate with elongated median feathers in Ptilogenys caudatus.
Both sexes of our irregular winter-visitor the Waxwing (Ampelis garrulus) are silky greyish-brown, with blackish wings, and tail relieved by yellow and white; a black forehead, eye-stripe, and throat; chestnut under tail-coverts and basal margin of the erectile crest; and, in the adults, flattened wax-like tips to the shafts of the secondaries or even the rectrices. The young are streaked below. Breeding near the Arctic Circle, and changing its quarters erratically, it occurs in the New as well as in the Old World, while in winter it migrates southwards to at least lat. 43° N. The flight is easy, graceful, and often high; the notes are of a trilling or of a chirping nature; the food consists of insects, berries, and other fruit. The nest of twigs and fibrous lichens, or of grass and bark, is placed on firs or birches, and contains from five to seven purplish-grey or drab eggs, with spots of black, brown, or lilac. The smaller North American A. cedrorum lacks the yellow and white on the wing; A. phoenicoptera, of Japan, North China, and East Siberia, has red, but not wax-like, tips to the remiges and rectrices.
Dulus dominicus, of San Domingo, is dark brown, varied with greenish and yellow, the yellowish-white lower surface shewing broad brown streaks. Several pairs often join their nests of twigs into a circular mass. Phaenoptila melanoxantha, of the Costa Rican hill-valleys, is glossy black, having an olive rump-band, and similarly coloured under parts with yellow sides and grey middle. The female is olive above with black crown. Phaenopepla nitens, of Mexico and the Southern United States, is bluish-black, with white on the primaries and vent-region; it has an erectile occipital crest. The hen is dark grey, with brown abdomen and a different distribution of white. This shy, active bird has the graceful movements of a Flycatcher, with a habit of jerking the tail; the song is plaintive or whistling; the food consists of insects and fruit. The flat nest, of fibres, grass, and down, contains from two to five greyish eggs, speckled with brownish-black and neutral tints: Ptilogenys cinereus, of the highlands of Central America, is plumbeous, with black remiges, black and white rectrices, loose broad lavender crest-plumes, and yellow under tail-coverts and flanks; the female is chiefly brown.