Vol. XIX 



] AsHBV, Birds of Mount Compass District, S.A. 2QQ 



Birds of Mount Compass District, South Australia. 

 15 V Edwin Ashhy, F.L.S., &€., Wittunga, Blackwood, 

 South Australia. 

 We liavc fur a long time intended to make the Mount Compass 

 district tlic objective of a two-days' collecting trip. In the past, 

 at most, all the collecting we have been able to do in this 

 locality was to step off for an hour or so when travelling by 

 motor from Port Victor to Adelaide. 



On the day following Christmas Day last Messrs F. E. Parsons, 

 J. N. M'Gilp, and the writer made an early start for this localit}', 

 slept under some sheltering pines, and returned the following 

 afternoon. 



The Mount Compass district is one of wide peaty swamps, 

 between scattered hills, with a sandy surface soil, and largely 

 covered with low bushes — Hill Oak, Tea-tree, &c. ; the whole area 

 being at a very considerable; altitude, and very cold and wet in 

 winter. 



The S.A. Museum records show that from time to time rare 

 birds were sent down from this district to the Museum more 

 than 30 years ago. 



On reaching the, small township of Mount Compass we made 

 arrangements for our meals and started off across a mile or so 

 of swamp, which, owing to the unusually dry season, was now 

 only swampy in places. Mirafra javanica scciinda (Sharpe), Lesser 

 Bush-Lark, were numerous in the wet portions of the swamp, 

 rising with their peculiar fluttering flight, and pitching down into 

 the swamp a short distance away. Anthiis australis was numer- 

 ous on the drier portions, and on the rising ground the Brown 

 Song-Larks, Cinclorhamphiis critralis, were still giving snatches of 

 their song as they slowly flew from one Grass-tree head to another. 



Amongst the dwarf bushes on the sandy rising ground Mr. 

 Parsons flushed and wounded a Calamanthiis campestris (Gould), 

 Field-Wren, but we could not ascertain for certain to which race 

 it belonged ; for, although several times our hands were almost 

 upon it, it at last got away. This bird is rare in our southern 

 districts. Next we secured a fine specimen of Hylacola can/a, 

 Rufous-rumped Ground-Wren. This was a most interesting find, 

 for, although we are familiar with it in our dry Mallee country, 

 none of our party had ever met with it in our wet hill country. 



Mr. M'Gilp flushed two small Quails, which he supposed were 

 Tiirnix velox, but later on we had reason to conclude that they 

 must have been females of the King Quail. Most of the country 

 we traversed had been burnt at no distant date, and was, there- 

 fore, unsuited to the Emu-Wren ; but a small flock of these 

 diminutive birds was located in some dense bushes growing in 

 a small area of still swampy ground. 



This was the first time that any of our part}- had seen the 

 Emu-Wren on the mainland of South Australia. I believe the 

 previous record of birds obtained from Mount Compass was more 



