/j.8 Ross, Some Bird-Life on the Muyvay Frontage. [ ,^f "q^ 



Some Bird^Life on the Murray Frontage, 



By J. A. Ross, Melbourne. 



{Read hcfor-e the Bird Observers' Club., ^oth June, 1906.^ 



A JOURNEY of 156 miles by an ordinary train in this State in 

 December is not a ride that one looks forward to with pleasure, 

 and a subsequent run, or crawl, of 23 miles on the Moama to 

 Deniliquin line in New South Wales during that month is even 

 less to be longed for; but the whole journey is well worth under- 

 taking if one has subsequent opportunities of studying our 

 feathered friends at close range. A drive of 7 miles from 

 Moama brought us to a farm-house at the junction (or rather 

 the dividing) of the Murray and Gulpa Rivers — here all streams 

 run out of, not into, the Murray. This farm-house was to be our 

 home for the time being. 



The first curiosity to be brought under our notice was a nest 

 of a White-browed Scrub- Wren i^Sericoriiis frontalis) built in the 

 fold of a potato sack hanging over a wire stretched between two 

 trees. The nest contained three young birds, almost ready to 

 leave their home. On the second day following that of our 

 arrival a visit was paid to a sandy ridge which has the re- 

 putation of having for many years past been a favourite nesting- 

 place for Bee-eaters {Merops ortiatus). We had no difficulty in 

 locating many burrows made by these birds, but a little time 

 spent in observation showed that the parent birds were busy 

 carrying food to almost every nest. Two which were dug out 

 proved that our assumption was correct — there were five young 

 birds in one and four young birds and an q^^ in the other, and 

 it was remarkable that no two young birds in the same nest 

 were exactly the same size. Apparently the parent birds had 

 sat on the nests from the laying of the first c^^g, and thus the 

 eggs were hatched in the same order and at the same intervals 

 as they had been laid. The Bee-eater is a shy bird, and the 

 patience of our photographer became exhausted in gazing along 

 about 50 feet of tubing which stretched between the screened 

 camera and a stump, behind which he was hidden. He had 

 my deepest sympathy, for the temperature was almost sufficient 

 to blister the varnish on the camera, and the bird would not 

 venture to enter its burrow in front of the lens.* Many rabbit 

 warrens were situated along that ridge, and there were foot- 

 prints and tail marks showing that every burrow had been 

 entered by iguanas, a fact that suggested that many a young 

 Bee-eater would be snapped up too, unless they are able to 

 leave the ground as soon as they come out of the nests. 



* This paper was well illustrated by the limelight views of Mr. A. H. E. Mat- 

 tingley. Two subjects — Nest of Wood-Swallow and Nest of Grebe^ — are here repro- 

 duced. — Eds. 



