THE FURTHER DISCOVERY of DUGONG BONES 

 ON THE COAST OF NEW SOUTH WALES. 



By R. ETiiEKiDfiE, Juni'., Curator. 



(Plate iv.) 



Fur an opportunity of again recording the occurrence of honea 

 of the Dugong (Halicore duyoruj, Gmelin, sp.) on the coast of 

 New South Wales, I am indebted to Mr. P. E. Williams, Comp- 

 troller of the Government Savings Bank, and Secretary to the 

 Sydney Etlniological Committee. 



During the excavation of Shea's Creek, Cook River, Botany 

 Bay, for the canal bearing the same name, portions of a Dugong 

 skeleton were discovered near the top of the estuarine clay, 

 iind just above the extensive estuarine shell bed which is so 

 marked a stratigraphical feature in the alknial section laid bare 

 by the canal cutting. " They were five feet six inches to eight 

 feet six inches below the present high-water level, and a total 

 depth of four feet six inches to seven feet six inches below the 

 swamp surface level, previous to excavation."^ The bones re- 

 covered were vertebra^, ribs, and the nearly perfect skull. It was 

 pointed out by Messrs. T. W. E. David, J. W. Grimshaw, and the 

 writer, that the present southerly limit of the Dugong is probably 

 Wide Bay, on the Queensland coast, although it was formerly to 

 be caught in Moreton Bay.- Only two reliable records of the 



1 Etlipridije, David, and Grimshaw — Journ. Roy. Soc. N.S. Wales, xxx 

 1896, p. 171. 



^ I have since learned that the Du^ono^ is still caught in Moreton Bay 

 Mr. C. Hedley has called my attention to a footnote in Britton and 

 Bladen's " History of New South Wales" (ii., 1894, p. 97) quoting 

 a paragraph from Collins, which reads as follows: — " Abouc this 

 time (March, 1795j, the spirit of inquiry being on foot, Mr 

 Cummings, an officer of the Corps, made an excursion to the 

 southward of Botany Boy, and brought bacii with him some of 

 the head bones of a marine animal, which on inspection Cap- 

 tain [William] Patterson the only naturalist in the country, 

 pronounced to liave belonged to the animal described by M. de 

 Buffon, and named by him the Manatee (Collins — Ace. English 

 Colony N.S.W., 1st Ed., 1.. p, 409.)" The wording in the second 

 edition differs slightly. If for Manatee we read Dugong we have 

 confirmatory evidence of the Shea's Creek occurrence, and at a 

 slightly more southern locality. 



