LEUCOSAHCIA. 



ir.i 



bcruhs on the ridses. After a time the W'ont^as fouii'l it, ami re-orted re,t<ularly to the place 

 for food. He then formed a cage about five or six feet S'luare and four feet high; it was 

 constructed of lawyer vines, placed about one inch apart, and driven into the ground, and others 

 worked through crosswise to strengthen the sides, a top then being added to it. Crushed maize 

 was then placed inside the trap, and which could easily be seen by the Pigeons, an aperture in 

 the sides, protected by " bob wires," opening inwards, allowing the birds to enter, but not to get 

 out again. When one was caught it induced others to enter, and after some days as many as 

 twenty birds would be in the trap at a lime; these in a little while became perfectly tame. 



These birds are included in the " Liird Protection Act "of New South Wales, and are 

 protected throughout the year. Formerly they used to be trapped principally with the aid of a 

 " crib " formed of sticks or vines and a little cracked maize, and many were sent alive to Sydney. 

 Frequently they could be seen exposed for sale in the bird-dealers, or those which had been 



shot hung up in the poulterer's shops. So much was 

 the flesh of this Pigeon esteemed as an article of 

 food, that numbers of them were frozen in the then 

 open season, so as to be alile to supply the demand 

 made by epicures later on. The greater part of the 

 birds then received in the metropolis was drawn from 

 the South Coast District. 



The Wonga Pigeon passes much of its time on 

 the ground picking up the fallen seeds and fruits of 

 various trees. In winter it feeds to a large extent on 

 the grass-eating larva> of Dipterous insects. 



The note of this Pigeon may be heard a consider- 

 able distance away. It is somewhat monotonous, 

 and resembles the sounds " \\'oclc a woclc, a wock " 

 repeated with the lips closed. The vernacular name 

 given t'l this species is obtained from its New South 

 Wales aboriginal name of W'onga-wonga. 



WONGA PIGEON. 



Mr. E. D. Barnard wrote from Kurrajong, Queens- 

 land : — "On the 4th December, igoj, I flushed a 

 W'onga-wonga from a partly built nest, at a height of 

 about twenty feet from the ground, in an ironbark sapling about a quarter of a mile from the 

 nearest scrub. Surely an unusual place for a scrub Pigeon to make a nest. I did not secure 

 the eggs." 



From Alstonville, New South Wales, Mr. JI.lv. Klvery writes me: — "My first nesting 

 experience with the Wonga Pigeon was in the year 1900, when I flushed a bird from a tree in 

 the second growth, and on climbing to the nest found that it contained two eggs. I was 

 disappointed, however, to find that the eggs were on the point of hatching. On the aSth July, 

 lyoo, again went to the nest, and was pleased to iind that the bird had laid again, as the nest 

 contained two fresh eggs. On 12th August, 1904, found another nest containing two eggs 

 partly incubated, the nest being built on a horizontal limb in the second growth. The next nest, 

 found on 2nd August, 1906, was built in some vines near the upright barrel of an .\cacia, 

 growing on the bank of a creek, and was placed twenty-seven feet from the ground, and contained 

 two eggs; and lower down the same creek, in the season 1907, I took three sets of two eggs 

 each from the same pair of birds. The first nest, taken 21st September, was built on the 

 horizontal limb of an .\cacia overhanging the bank of the creek, the nest being thirty-one feet 

 from the ground. The birds then resorted to a nest which had been built earlier in the season 



