Jhe £mu 



Official ©rgan of the Australasian dDrnithobgists' Enion. 



Bir<as of 21 fezitb^r. 



Vol. VII.] 1ST OCTOBER, 1907. [Part 2. 



A Visit to Heronries. 



Bv A. H. E. Mattingley, Melbourne. 



The main factor that impelled me to visit the neighbourhood of 

 Mathoura, situate in the heart of Riverina (N.S.W.) was due to 

 an impulse derived from the desire to make a closer acquaintance 

 with the heronries casually observed by me in my earlier years 

 whilst " camping-out " on many occasions during my annual 

 vacations amongst the large swamps of the River Murray basin. 

 Yielding to the impulse to study the bird-life of the swamps, 

 another ardent ornithologist, Mr. J. Ross, joined me, and we 

 journeyed by train to Mathoura on the 3rd November, 1906. 



When crossing the River Murray at Echuca we noticed that 

 the stream had risen in many places above its banks, and had 

 submerged the surrounding country. This flooding of the low- 

 lying lands set us wondering as to how^ we should be able to 

 reach our destination with our heavy baggage, remembering that 

 we had, on our previous visits to this locality, to drive 8 miles 

 through a series of swamps whose waters almost reached the 

 floor of our buggy as we proceeded through them ; and this 

 occurred in the dry summer months. On arriving at Mathoura 

 our doubts were soon set at rest. A large flat-bottomed boat 

 was awaiting us, vehicular traf^c being impossible, owing to the 

 v/ater, with which all the low-lying country was covered, being 

 now too deep to travel through. The inundation of the low- 

 lying lands contiguous to the river, the greatest waterway in 

 Australasia, is an annual occurrence, which in some respects 

 resembles the flooding of the Nile River basin. The increase 

 in the volume of the waters of the Murray at this time of the 

 year is due to the simultaneous melting of the snow lying on 

 the mountains at its source. Were it not for this annual 

 inundation of the swamp lands the main hatcheries of our 

 water birds would be destroyed, and many other species lose 

 their breeding habitat. The reason for this is not far to seek, 

 when we remember that the food supply of these birds is 

 derived from the waters of those natural incubators, the swamps, 

 into which the fishes retire to spawn in the seclusion and 

 apparent safety of the dense aquatic vegetable growths inhabit- 



