292 



NESTS AND EGGS OF AUSTRALIAN BIRDS. 



hard pushed for food, they will eat the gi-ain in its soft and milk)' state, 

 in the giound, germinating. Because of this, some farmers think all 

 Magpies should be destroyed. However, others are content to keep 

 watch over their fields from sunrise to sunset during the few weeks the 

 birds are most likely to attack the germinating gi'ain, because of the good 

 confeiTed upon the land by the Magpies in catching grubs, &c., during 

 the remainder of the year. What if the Magpie-s do take a little grain? 

 It is wiitten, " A labourer is worthy of his hire." One fruitgrower as 

 well as a farmer, after most favoiu'able opportunities of studying the 

 Magpie for over thirty years, wrote to the Hon. the Commissioner of 

 Customs (who administers the " Game Act ") to the effect that he fomid 

 the Magpie to be a fanner's friend and the best of insect destroyers. The 

 Magpies built their nests eveiy sea.son within a few yai'd.s of his residence, 

 and he had eveiy opportiuiity of knowing that the.se birds fed their young 

 extensively on insects of all kinds. 



It is well known that Magj>ies can be taught successfully to imitate 

 the human voice in speech. When they attain this accomplishment 

 they invariably drop their own clear wild notes, giving voice occasionally 

 to a loud, half-crowing, half-whistle-like sound, which is simply abomin- 

 able as compared with the delightful flute-like cadenza one hears the 

 bii'd pour forth when in native freedom. 



I was infoiTned of a gentleman who had a Magpie that lived in 

 captivity for thirty-one years. Tlie bird used to imitate the voice of 

 a relative who had been deceased for some time. 



Albino varieties occasionally occur in all kinds of birds. Tlie Magpie 

 would appear to be peculiarlv susceptible to this freak of nature, if we 

 may jvidgo by the number of birds we see exhibited at public shows, &c. 

 During the season of 1898. on the Wakool, Rivcrina, there was a nest 

 containing four young Magpies of the black-backed species, two of which 

 were true albinos, with pink-colomed eyes. At Warroo, in South 



Queensland, my venerable friend Mr. Hennann Lau once found a black- 

 backed Magpie's nest containing two eggs of that bird, in addition to a 

 pair of eggs of the Great Cuckoo or Channel Bill fSri/thrnps). He also 

 noted that on the Darling Dowms the Magpie usiially reared two broods 

 a seison, one in August, another about October. 



238. — Gymnorhina leuconota. Grav. — (93) 

 WHITE-BACKED MAGPIE. 



F;j?K>r.— Gould : Birds of Australia, fol,, vol. ii,, pi. 47, 



Referenci. — Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., vol. viii.,p 92 



Previous Descriptions of Eggs —GovXA : Birds of Australia (1S48) ; also, 

 Handbook, vol. i., p. 177 (1865) ; North: Austn. Mus. Cat, p 59 

 (1889); Campbell: Proc. Roy. Soc. Victoria, vol vii, new ser, 

 p. 212 (1894). 



Orrifiriijihiml Dixfrihution . — New South Wales, Victoria and South 

 Australia. 



