HUTOHIDES. 



;j9 



iMr. J. A. Boyd, while resident at Ripple Creek, Herbert River, (Queensland, sent me the 

 following notes: — " Among the mangroves I noticed a BntoiviJcs javciiiini flop like a Kinghsher 

 from a bough into deep water, catch a fish and return to its perch. Although these Bitterns 

 are very common in Fiji, 1 never remember seeing one do this before." 



Mr. George Savidge wrote me as follows from Copmanhurst, Upper Clarence River, New 

 South Wales, under date 2jrd December, 1895: — " The Thick-billed Mangrove Biitern (Butoroides 

 macrorhyncha) has not bred here at all this season, and I think the dry weather is the cause. 

 I have only found one nest with four eggs, but last year I obtained them \ery plentifully. Since 

 the late rains they seem to ha\e come back again, for I saw a number yesterday. These birds 



often sit on a stump just 

 above water, with their 

 heads bent down, and one 

 can see them make darts 

 with their bills into the 

 water. What they pick 

 up I do not know, but it 

 is apparently something 

 that floats by." 



\\'riting threeyears later 

 Mr. Savidge remarked : — 

 " The Little Mangrove 

 Bittern is dispersed along 

 the main course of the 

 Clarence River, from the 

 1 leads as far up as Gordon 

 Brook, a distance of over 

 one hundred miles by 

 water. I have seen several 

 pairs along the viaduct and 

 training walls at Yamba, 

 also along the edge of the 

 mangrove swamps there; 

 it is nowhere plentiful, and 

 confines itself to the main 

 channel or large tributaries 

 of the Clarence ; it does 

 not frequent so much the 

 small creeks or swamps as Dupdov •^otddi. The nest is a concave platform of small sticks and 

 twigs, about fourteen or fifteen inches in diameter, and is usually placed in the fork of a hoiizontal 

 branch hanging over water ; on one or two occasions I have found them several hundred yards 

 from water. The eggs are three or four for a sitting, mostly the latter, pale blue, and the smallest 

 of any of the Herodiones I have found. The nests are always placed singly and I have never 

 found it in colonies as described by Gould ; it commences to construct its nest in September, 

 and by the end of that month the eggs are usually laid, the breeding season continuing during 

 October, November and December. It builds quickly, taking about a fortnight to construct its 

 nest, and lay the full complement of eggs. .\i one time it was fairly plentiful about Copmanhurst, 

 but this unfortunate harmless bird, with many others, has been practically wiped out by gunners 

 who frequent the river in search of other wildfowl." 



The above figure is reproduced from a photograph taken by Mr. Savidge. 



NEST AND EGGS OF LITTLK MANGROVE BITTERN. 



