30 Bell, Breeding Habits of White Tern. [,sf "j"iy 



are largely covered with down, and long before the pinion feathers 

 are full grown. As soon as they are full feathered tliey go out 

 fishing with their parents during the daytime, but always return 

 to their birthplace to camp at night. It may be worth noting 

 that the young birds are very dexterous at catching files. They 

 do not eat them, but just crush and droj) them. This same j^ractice 

 is also indulged in by the young Masked (iannets {Sula cyanops), 

 but I have not noticed it in any other young sea-bird. 



The young White Terns leave Sunday Island during March and 

 April. 



Oologists in the Mallee. 



By F. Erasmus Wilson, R.A.O.U., Melbourne. 

 {^Read before the Bird Observers' Club., 20th December, 191 1.) 

 The following notes were collected during an oological excursion 

 made by Mr. F. E. Howe, F.Z.S., and myself to the Mallee 

 country, in the north-west of Victoria. Leaving Melbourne on the 

 26th of August, we journed to Ouyen, a new township lying 60 

 miles south of Mildura. We stayed there a day or two. and then 

 pushed 56 miles further west to Kow Plains, a district lying about 

 30 miles from the South Australian border. We spent some 

 days collecting in this neighbourhood, and then moved about 

 20 miles due north to a Government boring camp near the little- 

 known Sunset country. Here we were comfortably put up by Mr. 

 J. A. Scarce, and I here take the opportunity of thanking both 

 him and his brother, Mr. H. Scarce, for their kindness to us during 

 our stay. 



The country in the immediate neighbourhood of Kow Plains 

 consists of limestone flats, lightly timbered with Murray pine 

 and mallee (eucalypt scrub), while further north and south extends 

 an unbroken line of sand-ridges alternated with small fiats, the 

 sand-ridges running almost due east and west. There are a few 

 old, dried-up salt-pans near Kow Plains, and a feature of them 

 is the pure white hillocks devoid of vegetation. These are 

 known by their old native name "copai," and consist of almost 

 pure gypsum. Still further north are the dry salt lakes, which are 

 covered with a saline living plant known as blue-bush (Salicornia 

 arbnscula). From a spectacular point of view it would be hard to 

 find country of more dreary appearance ; but for the ornithologist 

 it is full of interest, containing as it does so many of the rarest 

 forms of bird-life. Ornithologically speaking this country is 

 closely allied to the drier tracts of Western Australia, as on 

 comparing the birds found here with those of the west you find 

 many affinities. The discovery of the new Miner, Myzantha 

 melanotis, so closely allied to the western form, M. obscura, and 

 the finding of a bird agreeing with Ptilotis novce-norcicB, the 

 western form of P. leiicotis, go far to strengthen the ornitho- 

 logical bond between the two localities. 



