Vo'jjXXi] TREGELLAS, Notes on the Lyre-Binl. 95 



Further Notes on the Lyre-Bird 

 (Menura superba) 



Bv TOM TREGEELAS, R.A.O.U., "Cosmos," Caniherwell, 

 Vic. 



With the idea of adding to our Hmited knowledge of the 

 home Hfe of the Lyre-Bird (Menura superba), I started out at 

 Easter, 1920, on a series of investigation. This series lasted, with 

 but few intervals, right through the winter and spring months, 

 terminating in October with the desertion of the nests by the 

 young. 



In early April the male began to prepare the mounds for his 

 ■display. Often fresh mounds were made, but sometimes the old 

 ones were furbished up and made usable. Nearly all were con- 

 nected, one with the other, by a path or runaway. The mounds 

 averaging 3. ft. 6 in. in diameter, and 6 in. in height, were gener- 

 ally placed in the midst of dense scrub or bracken, and were kept 

 in a state of tilth. In no instance was a mound discovered in 

 open country. All were incapable of approach from any direc- 

 tion without the presence of the intruder becoming known, and 

 I soon found that to see the male at all required much patient 

 stalking. One object of this persistent stalking was. to discover 

 on which mound the male called, as I wished to photograph him 

 at his devotions. I had a fair idea of the task ahead, as I had 

 previously seen the birds on the mounds, and had watched them 

 for a quarter of an hour at a time, but without a camera. 



When locating the mounds in April, I made the startling dis- 

 covery that one male bird used no less than eight different 

 mounds during the day, stopping a short time on each. The possi- 

 bility of picturing him on any particular mound was, therefore, 

 exceedingly remote. The first day I focussed upon a mound well 

 used. After covering up the camera and leading the long tube 

 to a log, I lay hidden, and w^aited a matter of five hours, but the 

 bird did not come near. He went down the gully, and up the 

 opposite range, where he had other mounds in the bracken. 

 Rain then came on, and I hid the camera in a hollow log, where 

 it remained for a night and a day. This was but a i^relude to 

 many weeks of anxious waiting, and, though I often worked 

 "from dewy morn to dusky eve," and the birds called most 

 tantalisingly from their mounds, it was always from some mound 

 other than the one where I was waiting. 



Till the end of August (when the love-making was over, and 

 no inducement offered to further i)arade), I worked unceas- 

 ingly. Then the bracken began to show^ through the mounds, 

 and the season for dancing was over. I had failed in one i)ur- 

 pose, but was not disheartened. 



On June 26th, the first Sassafras flower was seen, and, as this 

 plant flowers only when the Lyre-Birds nest, the sight to us was 



