I 64 Campbell, Birds of the U pper Yarra. [isf A^rii 



ci})itous the Calyptorhynchus and Cacatua disappear, but their 

 relatives Callocephalon and Platyccrcus remain in evidence, until 

 finally, when the stream becomes a mountain torrent in its far-up 

 reaches, one is introduced to new genera like Meniira, Pycnoptilus, 

 Petrceca, Geocichla, and species such as Rhipidura rufifrons, Eopsal- 

 tria australis, Pachycephala olivacea, and Ptilotis lewini, all distinctive 

 of fern-clad country. 



Birds, however, of any species are in numbers few and far 

 between — in fact, when scrambling along with the din of rushing 

 water constantly in one's ears, one would be inclined to say there 

 were no birds, but sit quietly for a while and the eye will pick 

 out a Sericornis here and an Acanthiza there. Rarely can the 

 ear, the naturalist's keen guide, be of much assistance. The 

 Mennra victories is perhaps the commonest bird in these jjarts, 

 judging by the number of fresh dancing mounds which are met 

 with ; so late in the year, though several males were heard, the 

 whistling is not so frequent and persistent as in the nesting 

 time. 



Pushing still further on, the traveller leaves the rocky cascades 

 of the gold-bearing silurian country, and emerges, at about 2,500 ' 

 feet, on to gently undulating granite tracts, which are characterized 

 by slowly moving, oozy streams in the depressions and forests of 

 beech or Fagits trees clothing the ridges. In these forests, with 

 little fallen timber and the ground clothed with Lomaria ferns, so 

 totally unlike the gum or Eucalyptus forests, the bird-life is scant 

 in the extreme, and the absence of the noise of rushing water 

 makes them park-like solitudes indeed. Only here and there will 

 a bird be noted, and in the list those seen in this country are 

 specially marked. The presence of Climacteris leucophcea, Apros- 

 mictus cyanopygius, and Platyccrcus elcgans is accounted for by 

 the presence of single grand specimens of eucalypts towering in 

 odd places among the beech, just as, on the other hand, the beech 

 trees creep down the valley along the riverside. It was in beech 

 country that a pleasing incident occurred with the Lyre-Birds. We 

 listened to a young male trying his vocal powers with, presumably, 

 his parent, both birds making the silence re-echo with their loud, 

 fall-throated calls. 



The only Coachwhip-Bird [Psophodcs crepitans) noted was in the 

 beech forest. 



In parts of these uplands occur large patches of woollybutt 

 eucalypts, tall and straight, and the only bird that seemed to 

 inhabit them was a small al])ine variety of Ptilotis leucotis. On 

 account of the tallness of the trees we were unfortunately unable 

 to shoot a bird for complete identification. It can hardly be 

 expected that a species frequenting tall timber in forest country, at 

 an altitude of 3,000 feet above sea level, can be exactly the same 

 as the lowland bird, which is almost a desert species in some 

 localities. 



A record must here be made of a new foster-parent of Cacomantis 

 variolosus — namely, Petraxa rhodinogastra (Pink-breasted Robin), 



