702 Mr. Edwin Ashby on the [This, 



XXXVIII. — Notes on the Mound-building Birds of Australia, 

 with Particulars of Features peculiar to the Mallee-Fowl, 

 Leipoa ocellata Gould, and a Suggestion as to their Origin. 

 By EuwiN AsHBY, M.B.O.U. 



We are familiar with tbe views advanced by several writers 

 that the Imbit of artificially incubating their eggs, conitnon 

 to the Mound-building Birds of Australia, is a survival from 

 their reptilian ancestors. The following notes suggest an 

 alternative explanation, which the data advanced seem 

 sutliciently to support. 



Megapodius reinwardti Diimont. 



The huge mounds made by the Jungle-Fowl, Megapodius 

 reinwardti, are well known. In VJ06 Mr. C. E. May, who 

 was workinc- on the Government Bore, then testino- the shale 

 for coal, at Port Keats, in the Northern Territory, at my 

 request very kindly took the follovving measurements and 

 supplied me with the notes hereunder : — 



All the nests were flattened at the top and were more or 

 less covered with brush-wood, which Mr. May thought had 

 been placed there by the birds with the probable purpose of 

 retarding evaporation and thereby keeping the surface-soil 

 of the mound from baking hard. He also suggested that 

 the flattening of the top was due to the frequent digging 

 out of the eggs by the aboriginals. 



The mounds are placed in thick jungle, and usually large 

 Tamarind-trees are growing out of them. The Megapode 

 feeds largely on the fruit of the Tamarind, which probably 

 accounts for the consistency with which these trees occur in 

 the mounds, the seeds being excreted by the birds. The same 



