16 president's address. 



much has been done by x\ustralian naturalists towards the solu- 

 tion of these problems. This is all the more regrettable, because, 

 as a consequence of the rapid spi-ead of settlement, and the in- 

 creasing recjuirements of civilisation, many of our plants and 

 animals are fast moving towards the limbo of lost thini-s where 

 they will meet with the Dodo, and the Great Auk. The spread 

 of the cities and the operations of land-vendors are rapidly de- 

 stroying our highly specialised, local flora; and, with the plants, 

 the animals also disappear. And with them will disappear the 

 opportunity for research into their bionomics. In the vicinity 

 of all our towns, the flora is becoming a cosmopolitan one, and 

 the Australian element forms but a small portion of it. It 

 behoves us, then, before it is too late, to get to work on the 

 bionomics of our native plants and animals. 



A very important problem among these is the pollination of 

 Australian flowers by birds. Looking into this question, on the 

 suggestion of Mr. J. J. Fletcher, I was surprised to discover how 

 little definite information on the subject of bird-pollination was 

 to be found. The fact that a given species of bird visits a flower, 

 is often taken as evidence that the flower is pollinated by that 

 bii'd, but as to the method by which it is done, no record is made. 

 Schiuiper(3) quotes Belts' description of the pollination of Marc- 

 gravia, and goes on: "Since Belt's classical description, and the 

 unfortunately very short communications of F. Miiller, the know- 

 ledge of humming-bird flowers has not made any considerable 

 progress, for the surmises of several botanists formed far away 

 from the home of humming-birds cannot be considered as such. 

 The share taken by humming-birds in causing the peculiarities of 

 many American flowers, can be ascertained only by careful and 

 critical investigations on the spot." These remarks apply equally 

 well to pollination by birds in Austi'alia. 



One of the first questions arising is, Are bird-pollinated flowers 

 specially adapted in any way? Certainly many of them do pre- 

 sent special features. Hermann Muller(2) says that ornithophil- 

 ous flowers present several types. Many of them possess large, 

 brilliantly coloured flowers, very frequently scarlet, pouched in 



