202 AgUILIN.E, 



" Eagle-luuvks " tlirouj,'hout the entire State, Carcoar District heading tlie list witli 342 birds 

 destroyed. It must be with feelings of dismay, however, that a pastoralist compares these two 

 Official Reports, for a greater and more deadly scourge than " Eagle-hawks," rabbits or hares 

 is rapidly spreading over the State; I refer to foxes, whose ravages are already well known. In 

 iSgg bonuses were paid on 1527 foxes, destroyed in different parts of the entire State. Eight 

 years later, in iijn;, 30,771) foxes and cubs were destroyed, the Young District heading the list 

 with 5349 of these animals. In the tuture, when all the ground game is cleared by these 

 acclimatised curses, then more than e\er will foxes turn their attention to the flocks of the 

 pastoralist. 



These birds are keen sightetl and curious, and anythmg nioxing at once arrests ttieir 

 attention. The Re\'d. J. iNIilne Curran, who had just returned from Mount Kosciusko, in 

 South-eastern New South Wales, and the highest peak in .Australia, informed me he was 

 much amused with a Wed^e-tailed Eagle, which made repeated attacks at a dog he had with hiin. 

 The gieatest fun was caused, however, by rolling heavy boulders down the declivity, which the 

 Eagle savagely attacked, and vainly made repeated attempts to stop with its outstretched talons. 

 After witnessing this several times one of the party with a gun remained behind, laying flat on 

 the ground; the Eagle then gradually came close to him, when he flred and shot it ; theexpanse 

 of wing measuring six feet across, fiagles are fairly numerous in this district. Below the rocky 

 side of Mount Kosciusko is a small but picturesque lake, known by the aboriginal name of 

 Cootapatamba, " the lal^e where the l-^agles drink." 1 



From Dr. K. l'>. Siiarpe's '■ History ot the Collections of the ijritish Museum,"' it may be 

 learnt that Latham, whose name obtains as the authority for this species, took his description 

 from one of Watling's drawings, made in the early days of settlement in New South Wales, 

 and also appropriates his notes without making any reference to him. Althouj;;!! noted by 

 several writers, more particularly during the early history of the State, as frequenting the 

 neighbourhood of Sydney, it is very seldom, or never, that it occurs now, the last specimen 

 received by the Trustees of the Australian Museum lieing a young bird shot by Mr. J. D. 

 Partridge on the ist June, iSSb, at Lane Cove, about three miles from the city. It is more 

 often met with, but is by no means common, about and beyond the mountainous outskirts of the 

 County of Cumberland, notably in the rugged ranges of the Hawkesbury River and Upper 

 Nepean District, a specimen being received from Mr. Michael Rafferty, of Colo Wale, on the 

 Nth July, 1907. 



There is a great variation in colour of adult birds, some of them being much paler in breeding 

 plumage on the nape, hind-neck and upper wing-coverts, being of a light creamy-buff. Usually 

 this is put down to youth, but such is not always the case, as may be seen by the (juills and 

 tail-feathers, many being found breeding before they assume the general blackish-brown plumage, 

 and which is only the livery of very old birds. In Central Australia Mr. C. Ernest Cowle 

 informs me both adults and young are much prized by the Aborigines on account of their 

 feathers and down, and that these birds are occasionally killed either with boomerang or spear 

 when gorged or gorging on offal or a dead kangaroo. 



Mr. H. G. Barnard writes me from Bimbi, Duaringa, (Queensland : — "One nest of ('iV{etiis 

 aitdax visited on the 2nd of June, 1907, contained two young a few days old ; the nest was built 

 in a large Swamp Gum, and was sixty feet from the ground ; the hind (juarters of a freshly 

 killed opossum were placed on the side of the nest. I visited this nest previously on the 

 2Sth of May, 1906 ; it then contained one young just hatched, and an egg out of which the beak 

 of a young bird protruded ; also a dead Blue-tongued Lizard, a leg of an Opossum, and a young 

 Bronze-wing Pigeon (Phaps chalcoptcra), on which the pin feathers were just bursting ; it had 



Hist. Coll. Bds. Brit. Mus., p. 109 (1906). 



