724 NESTS AND EGGS OF AUSTRALIAN BIRDS. 



March many birds are shot on the flats and stubble fields, but during 

 April and May sportsmen find that they are getting scarce in such 

 places, and nine out of ten shooters will tell you that the birds are 

 migrating. Not so; they have only gone to better feeding grounds, 

 and will not be far off. The great wastes of barren bayonet or spear 

 gi'ass plains are the winter home of the Stubble Quail. The birds feed 

 on the rich simflower-hke seed of the spear-gi-ass. There are miles of 

 spear grass plains in South Gippsland, stretching from the mouth of 

 Powlett River rovmd to Foster. In winter Quail are to be foimd 

 whei'ever the spear-gi'ass is in seed. The rat-tail-shaped seed pods are 

 known locally as black-heads. Shooting over these plains I kill mostly 

 stubble birds in the open, and Brown Quail on the edges of patches 

 of stunted tea-tree. On the dry ridges I get an occasional brace of 

 Faulted birds. The plains simply swann with the Uttle King Quail. 

 The best shooting is to be had in June and July. In March a good 

 shot should account for every bird rising within range, for, as a nile, 

 they are mostly squeakers, but on the open spear grass plains on a 

 chilly winter's day, with a stiff breeze blowing, the fine, full-conditioned 

 Stubble or Brown Birds get away with strength and speed, that will 

 test the skill of the most expert. Duiing last winter (1896) Quail were 

 exceptionally plentiful on the Powlett Plains, and at Cape Patterson, 

 but the market shooters swept over the country, and cleaned them out 

 to a bird. There were hundreds of brace shot round about the village 

 of Inverloch alone. Tlie marketer uses the best nitro powders, and 

 I have seen one tramping behind eight setters, working regularly day 

 after day, and kilhng ovit every bird, often shooting as many as thirty 

 brace in a day. When a marketer camps on a sliooting gromid he 

 appears to consider that he is sole owner of the game, and manfully 

 cUsputes the right of anyone else to shoot. I need scarcely say that he 

 is not much loved by the sporting Quail shooter. When shooting in 

 winter on the plains I have noticed the absence of Hawks. One would 

 natru-ally expect to find them where game is so plentiful, yet wo 

 rarely see anything but an occasional Eagle. I often shoot specimens 

 of the domestic cat gone wild, foxes and native cats on the Quail 

 grounds ; and I think the fox is the greatest enemy they have." 



Young in down resemble miniature chicks of a domestic fowl, being 

 brownish in colour, indistinctly striated with black. 



562-3. — Syncecus australis, Temminck. — (487, 489 and 490) 

 S. sordidus, Gould. 

 S. cervinus, Gould. 



BROWN QUAIL. 



Figure.— GonXd : Birds of Australia, fol., vol. v., pis. 89 and 91. 



Reference. — Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., vol. xxii., p. 247. 



I'revious Descriptions of Eggs.— Gou\d : Birds of Australia (1848) , 



also Handbook, vol. ii., pp. 193 and 196 {1865) ; North : Austn. 



Mus. Cat., pp. 289 and 291 (1889) ; Campbell : Proc. Roy. 



Soc, Victoria, vol. iii., p. 5, pi. i, fig. 6 (1890) ; North : Trans. 



Roy. Soc, South Australia, vol. xxii., p. 16.1 (iSqSl. 



Qi-dcjrapMcttl Dixtrihntion. — Whole of Au.stralia and Tasmania, 

 including islands in Bass Strait; also New Guinea. 



