This species, thus considered, breeds apparently twice a year from
April to June, and again in October and even later.
About Madras the nest is commonly placed in thick thorny hedges of a shrub locally known as "Kurka-puli," said by Balfour to be Garcinia cambogia, but which does not look like a Garcinia at all. The nest is a loosely-made cup, composed of grass-stems and roots, and the eggs vary from three to five in number.
Dr. Jerdon says:—"I have often found the nest of this bird, which is composed of small twigs and roots, carelessly and loosely put together, in general at no great height from the ground. It lays three or four blue eggs."
Colonel Butler writes:—"A nest containing four fresh eggs apparently of this species (it being the common Babbler in this district) was brought to me by some wood-cutters on the 18th March, 1880. It was taken in the jungles about six miles from Belgaum, and measured about 2¾ inches in diameter and about 2 inches deep interiorly, and was of the usual Babbler type, consisting of dry stems loosely but neatly constructed. The eggs were highly glossed and deep bluish green, some people might say greenish blue."
Mr. Iver Macpherson writes of this bird from Mysore:—"I have found their nests in every month between March and August, and they possibly breed both earlier and later. The nests are generally fixed in thorny bushes and at no great height off the ground. Four is the usual number of eggs laid, but very often five are found, and I feel much inclined to think that the fifth egg is often that of H. varius."
The eggs of this species that I possess were taken by Mr. Davison in May, in the immediate neighbourhood of Madras. They are all pretty regular, somewhat cylindrical ovals, excessively glossy, spotless, and of a deep greenish blue, much deeper than the eggs of any of the other Crateropi are as a rule; in fact, they approach in colouring to the eggs of Garrulax albigularis.
They vary in length from 0·9 to 1·0, and in breadth from 0·62 to 0·74; but I have seen too few eggs to be able to strike any reliable average.
112. Crateropus striatus (Sw.). The Southern-Indian Babbler.
Malacocercus striatus (Sw.), Hume, Cat. no. 432 bis.
Colonel Legge, writing of this bird's nidification in Ceylon, says:—"The breeding-season of the 'Seven Brothers' lasts from (page 80 in the book.) March until July. The nest is placed in a cinnamon-bush, shrub or bramble, at about four feet from the ground, and is a compact cup-shaped structure, usually fixed in a fork and made of stout grasses and plant-stalks and lined with fine grass, which, in some instances I have observed, was plucked green. The interior measures 2½ inches in depth by about 3 in width. The eggs are two or three in number, small for the size of the bird, glossy in texture, and of a uniform opaque greenish blue. They measure from 0·91 to 1·0 in length, by 0·7 to 0·74 in breadth."