BLOODTHIRSTINESS OF THE NATIVE CAT 61 



prey of the native pole-cat (as it should be called), consists 

 of birds both small and of considerable size. For though 

 it is arboreal in habits, it leaves the trees at night, and 

 neglecting the swarms of rabbits, seems to make straight 

 for the homesteads of the squatters where it, or at most a 

 pair of them, show their truly weasel-like instinct by 

 destroying fowl after fowl. Sometimes as many as 

 twenty head of poultry are killed in a single night, 

 apparently for the sake of their blood, which always seems 

 to be sucked from the body. Not many of these animals 

 are caught in traps ; and they work so silently that, unless 

 they are specially watched for, the unfortunate squatter or 

 farmer is seldom made aware of the fell work going on 

 in his hen-roost. 



In the trees they destroy many young birds ; and 

 pigeons and parrots are surprised in their nesting and 

 roosting places, and captured in great numbers. This I 

 have clearly traced by means of the feathers and such 

 remains as the feet, beaks, and bones. The head is 

 usually eaten, or at least the brains and eyes sucked out. 

 The allied animals, known to the colonists as 'possums, also 

 suffer greatly from their more powerful kinsmen ; and an 

 occasional tree-snake falls a victim to these ravenous 

 " cats," but though the opossums eat insects, I have never 

 found any evidence that the cats do so, and I think they 

 are altogether too fierce and ravenous to concern them- 

 selves with such small prey. It is a wonder and a pity 

 that the native cat does not take to preying on the rabbits 

 which abound in so many parts of the country ; but, as I 

 have already hinted, none of the Australian carnivorous 

 animals have as yet taken to making serious attacks on 

 them. I have never seen an eagle or a hawk with one in its 

 talons ; the snakes and the dingoes may destroy a few, but I 

 have only met with scant evidence that they do so. 

 Ferrets and weasels have been imported into the country 

 from England for the purpose of thinning their numbers ; 

 but these ferocious little animals preferred attacking the 

 poultry they were brought to protect, and proved only an 

 addition to the nuisance. Poultry are kept in large 



