71) CACA'l'l'lD^'E. 



diet, and blioidd be tried with \ arious f^rains, lVc, wlieii it will e\ eiUually settle down on one kind 

 for the rest of its days. These birds make an easy target for the so-called sportsman, and a 

 male I have had in my possession for the past six years was shot in the wing, which fortunately 

 caused little damage. The bird was in the young plumage, and it took three years before it was 

 at its best, and each succeeding year the red crest and head became brighter and the body colour 

 greyer. 1 ha\e seen them in the Nowra District, New South Wales, come in numbers 

 at dusk, crashing into the ripening corn, and in a short while do considerable damage. 

 Although I have never seen the nesting-place, on several occasions the farm lads brought in 

 broods of young birds. I ha\e never succeeded in breeding them in confinement, although I 

 repeatedly saw the male bird dancmg before the female, throwing his head forward, spreading 

 his crest and croaking and cackling in a peculiar manner." 



From Melbourne, X'ictoria, Mr. (i. A. Keartland sends me the following note: -" Whilst 

 most species of Cockatoos feed principally on j^nain or le,i;uminous seeds, Calhnt[>hali>ii i^alcatuin 

 lives almost exclusively on the seed of the liucalypt. 1 recently skinned a pair of Gang Gang 

 Cockatoos from Croydon, and from the crop of each bird took an egg-cupfuU of Eucalyptus 

 seed ; in fact, when killed their flesh smells strongly of this food. They are usually seen in 

 pairs, but during the winter months they congregate in flocks. On two occasions I ha\-e seen 

 them on the bush tracks in the r)andenong Ranges picking over the droppings from the carters' 

 horses. Some of the male birds acijuire the scarlet on their heads at a very early age. One 

 that 1 kept for some time was scarlet on the head before it could teed itself." 



An egg of this species in Mr. G. A. Keartland's collection, taken at South Gippsland, 

 Victoria, is a rounded o\'al in form, white, the shell being close-grained, but thickly and hnely 

 pitted and lustreless. It measures: — Length 1-35 x ni inches. 



Of half-fledged birds taken from nestin,L;-places 1 have seen a number. ( )n the joth January, 

 i.'S92, M. (Jctave Le Bon had eight young birds, taken by a bird-catcher at Murrumburrah, New 

 South Wales. He informed me that the man who obtained them found two birds in each nesting- 

 place. On the 2nd February, 1SQ3, I saw two more young birds in M. Le lion's shop 

 taken by the same bird-catcher, and in the same locality as the previous year. Near the 

 General Post Office, Sydney, on the 8th June, iqoo, I saw a fledged male and female for sale in 

 George Street. Excepting the different species of Black Cockatoos, these birds used to command 

 a higher price than any other species of Australian Psittvci. I have known ./ 15 15s. to be 

 offered for a pair of adult birds, £2 paid for a young bird, and I am aware of their being sold for 

 15/- each. Young birds are very difficult to rear, and that is probably the reason there are so 

 many young specimens in the collection of the Australian Museum. 



\'oung males resemble the adult females, e.xcept on the feathers of the back, which have no 

 pale or dull grey cross-bar ; on the under parts either the sulphur-yellow or dull scarlet margins 

 to the feathers may predominate, or, as is nrore often the case, there is an admixture of both 

 these colours, some of the feathers on the forehead are tipped with dull scarlet, and the crest 

 feathers are dull scarlet with grey bases. Wing g inches. The last trace of immaturity is 

 exhibited in a nearly adult male by the remains of indistinct greyish barrings on the tail-feathers. 



In New South Wales the normal breeding season is during October and the three following 

 months. At Mount \"ictoria, on the Blue Mountains, three thousand four hundred and twenty- 

 four feet above the sea level, I noted on the 6th March, igog, a pair of adults. They were 

 remarkably tame, and low down in the wide-spreading branches of a Eucalyptus, the male 

 feeding himself, but the female stopped now and again to attend to the wants of a pair of fully 

 fledged young ones, the male of which had the crest scarlet, the young female exhibiting the 

 barrings on the under parts of the plumage. I saw this same flock of birds several times during 

 the previous week, and it was evident that the young ones were bred in the nei,L;hbourhood. 



The figure represents an adult male. 



