Wild life under the equator

by Paul B. Du Chaillu

Among the strangest of them all there was one that especially attracted my attention. As I approached the plantation I could hear, just on the edge of the forest, a noise that sounded very much as if some far-away people were hammering at something, or I should rather say, as if people were hammering at a tree. I carefully approached the place. I am sure you could not have heard my steps on the ground, so carefully I approached. I was dressed in a dark-blue suit of cotton goods, so that the birds might not notice me. At last I recognized the noise as coming from old friends of mine. They were birds that were hammering at two or three dead trees in such earnest that none of them observed me.

It was a very pretty sight! The country being nothing else than a gigantic forest, of course, wherever a village or plantation is made, the trees have to be cut down, and nearly all are cut from a height of ten or fifteen feet. These in the course of time become dry, and after being dead a sufficient time the wood softens, and becomes the object of the attack of the beautiful little bird I am writing about. It is really a beautiful bird, and was unknown before I brought it here. It has been named the Barbatula du Chaillui. The throat and breast are of a glossy blue-black color; the head is scarlet; a line of canary yellow from above the eyes surrounds the neck, and the back, which is black, is covered with canary yellow spots. Above the bill it has what might be termed two little brushes.

The trunks of the trees on which they were so busily engaged were within a few yards of the forest. These birds were hard at work with their bills, pecking out circular openings about two inches in diameter. It was a tedious operation, and now and then a little bird had to rest, or its mate would come and take its place. Their little feet are constructed like those of the woodpeckers, to whom they are somewhat related, but their bill is much thicker, stronger, and shorter, hence better adapted to make holes in the trunks of trees.

HOW THEY BUILD THEIR NESTS.

It was very interesting to see them holding to the trees, sometimes with their heads upward and sometimes with their heads downward. Some had just begun to work at the aperture, others had already made a pretty deep hole, and the end of their tail only could be seen, while still others were working inside, and their bodies could not be seen at all, though now and then they came forth, bringing the wood they had pecked out.

THE BARBATULA WORKING.

What difficult and patient toil! The making of one of these nests requires many days. It is no easy work for birds a little bigger than a sparrow to peck out a circular opening of two inches in diameter, and more than two inches deep. This done, they dig perpendicularly down for about four inches. The cavity thus made is their nest. As they are small birds, it takes them a long time to finish this piece of carpentering—often two or three weeks. There the female lays her eggs and hatches them in security, no snake or wild animal being able to disturb them.

Not only do they use these nests while they are hatching, but also during the rainy season. How cosy they must feel in these places of refuge when a storm is raging! Nothing could be safer, or better shelter them from the rain. The aperture being about two inches in thickness before you come to the perpendicular hollow, of course the rain can not reach the inside.

I have seen trees entirely perforated by them; that is to say, having more than a dozen of these holes in them; and thus forming what we may call a little village of themselves. I wonder if they had a king! These birds are very shy, and the least noise will frighten them. How affectionate the pair seemed to be, how willing they were to help each other in their work!