150 



MELIPHAGID.E. 



contained among others, skins of Ptilotis keartlandi, Myzomda nigra, Emhlcma picfa, Ephthianura 

 aurifrons, thus extending the range of the present species across the northern portion of the 

 continent. 



Writing me in :\Iay, 1902, while resident at Point Cloates, Xorth-western Austraha, Mr. 

 Tom Carter remarks: — "Ptilotis keartlandi is fairly plentiful in the ranges here and on the scrubby 

 tableland behind them. I first noticed this bird in 1890, and sent a skin to Melbourne, as 

 I thought then it was a new species, but was informed that it was Ptilotis sonora. It is an 

 active little bird, much resembling in habits P. leilavalaisis and P. sonora, and I have seen it in 



company with the latter species and Glycyphila 

 ocularis, all busy probing the flowers of a tree. It 

 appears to breed after rain at the end of summer. 

 I have found fledgelings in April and took a nest 

 with two incubated eggs, in the drooping leaves 

 of a desert gum in May, 1900." While in 

 ^lelbourne in November, 1895, ^^^- G. A. 

 Heartland showed me a skin of Ptilotis keartlandi, 

 that had been obtained by Mr. Carter in North- 

 western Australia. 



A nest of this species, taken by Mr. C. 

 Ernest Cowle,in April, 1898, at Illamurta, Central 

 Australia, is now before me. It is an open cup- 

 shaped and very compactly built structure, out- 

 wardly formed of dried plant stems and grasses, 

 firmly woven together with spiders' webs and 

 cocoons, the inside being lined with a few wiry 

 rootlets and a very thick layer of plant down. 

 Externally it measures three inches and a half 

 in diameter by two inches and a quarter in 

 depth ; the inner cup measuring two inches and 

 a quarter in diameter by one inch and a quarter 

 in depth. It was built about seven feet from 

 the ground in the thin leafy stems of a Cassia 

 phyllodinca, to which it is firmly secured by the 

 rim on one side and the upright twigson the other. 



The nest figured was taken on the 20th 

 April, 1900, near the Fitzroy River, North- 

 western Australia, and is much smaller than 

 average nests taken by Mr. C. E. Cowle at 

 Illamurta, Central Australia. It is built on one side 

 against a thin three-pronged leafy branch, and is 

 attached on the other to a very thin leafy stem, 

 several of the leaves being pulled down and worked into the side of the nest. Externally it is 

 formed of very thin dried grass stems matted together with silky plant down, the inside of the nest, 

 except near the rim, being entirely lined with the latter material ; it measures two inches and a 

 half in external diameter by one inch and three-quarters in depth; the inner cup measuring two 

 inches in diameter by one inch and a quarter in depth. This nest contained two eggs, which 

 are now in the collection of Dr. Charles Ryan of Melbourne. 



Mr. C. Ernest Cowle writes me from Illamurta, Central Australia: — "I took a nest of 

 Ptilotis keartlandi with two fresh eggs in February, 1896, and another with two fresh eggs early 

 in .April, 1898. They were both built in young growth of mulga." 



NKST AND EOGS OF HEARTLAND S HON'EY-EATEK. 



