AS'SKKANA.S. 5.") 



the number. In stating this at eight thousand we consider we are well within the mark. In 

 our various excursions around the lagoon, we were surprised to see so few young birds, and but 

 very few nests were visible. Local residents accounted for this by the prevalence throughout 

 the nesting season of exceptionally heavy winds, which had worked devastation among the nests, 

 overturning aud destroying them, together with the eggs. Whether the birds hold their own in 

 point of numbers it is difficult to say from observation only, the Hocks being so large that one 

 would only notice an immense diminution. If they do, however, it is a subject for wonderment 

 when consideration is given to the many factors which operate against them, such as occasional 

 disastrous breeding seasons, the numbers shot each year, and worse still the wholesale manner 

 in which the eggs are taken." 



The nest is a large open thick-walled structure of twigs, aquatic plants, leaves, rushes, etc., 

 and slightly lined inside with down, plucked from the breasts of the parent birds, and is usually 

 in or near the vicinity of water. 



The eggs are generally five or six in number for a sitting, but sometimes eight or nine are 

 found; they are elliptical in form, of a pale green or dull greenish-white, usually more or less 

 covered with brown nest stains, the shell being coarse-grained and slightly lustrous. A set of 

 six taken by the late Mr. K. H. Bennett at Yandembah Station, in the Lower Lachlan District, 

 New South Wales, measures :— Length (A) 4-3 x 2-55 inches; (B) 4-15 x 2-52 inches; (C) 

 4-22 X 2-6 inches; (0)4-12 x 2-58 inches; (E) 4-18 x 2-59 inches; (F) 4-23 x 2-6 inches. 

 A set of eight taken by him in the same locality measures as follows: — Length (A) 4-1 x 2-5 

 inches; (B) 4-12 x 2-52 inches ; (C) 4-22 x i-6 inches; (D) 4-21 x 2-62 inches; (E) 4-08 x 

 2-56 inches; (F) 3-98 x 2-62 inches ; (6)4 x 2-6 inches; (H) 4-08 x 2-58 inches. 



Immature birds may be distinguished from the adults by the feathers of the lower back and 

 rump being soft and downy, and by having the apical half of the white primaries and secondaries 

 margined and tipped with brownish -black. 



In South-eastern Australia the usual breeding season is generally from August to the end 

 of December, but it is greatly regulated by the rainfall, and in dry seasons many birds do not 

 breed at all. On the contrary, in unusually wet seasons they breed during the autumn and early 

 winter months. Dr. A. Chenery taking eggs in South Australia in April, and the late Mr. K. H. 

 Bennett in New South Wales in June. In North-western Australia Mr. Tom Carter noted eggs 

 in different seasons between the ist May and the 12th June. 



Sub-family ANSERANATIN^. 



O-en-U-S -A.ISrSEI5-^^:L<r.A.S, Lesson. 



Anseranas semipalmata. 



SEMIPALMATED GOOSE. 



Anns semipalmata, Lath., Trans. Linn. Soc, Vol. VI., p. 103 (1798). 



Anseranas laelannleuca, Gould, Bds. Au.str., fol. Vol. VII., pi. 2 (1848) ; id., Handbk. Bds. Austr., 

 Vol. IL, p. 352 (1865). 



Ameranas semipalmata, Salvad., Cat. Bds. Brit. Mus., Vol.XXVlI., p. 41 (1895) ; Sharpe, Hand-1. 

 Bds, Vol. I., p. 208 (1899). 



Adult male. — -Head, neck, mantle, lower back, tail and thighs black; ivings broivnish-black ; 

 scapulars, breast, abdomen, upper and under tail-coverls white. Total length 36 inches, tcing 17, 

 tail 7-,'j, bill -J-Jo, tarsus 3-5. 



