Q/j. Macgillivray, The Region of the Barrier Range. [isf'oct 



mulga. A pair of Tricoloured Chats, by fussing about, revealed 

 their nest, containing three well-feathered young, in the end of 

 a fallen dead bush, openly placed. A Tit {A. uropygialis) was 

 busy building in a dead stump close by, and a Black Honey-eater 

 on the end of a fallen mulga. • Another pair of Tricoloured Chats 

 were feeding three young birds that had left the nest. A Red- 

 capped Robin's nest was seen. After an interval I found an 

 Oreoica's nest low down in an old V-shaped turpentine ; it con- 

 tained one egg. I then passed through some neelia and larger 

 mulga, in which many Black Honey-eaters were feeding on the 

 mistletoe, together with a few Singing Honey-eaters and " Greenies." 

 M'Lennan later reported having found a Tit's {A. uropygialis) nest 

 containing three eggs ; a Many-coloured Parrakeet's nest, with 

 six young birds, sprouting feathers ; a nest of the Blue-Bonnet 

 (P. xanthorrhoiis), containing six nearly fledged young ones — both 

 nests placed in a hollow box tree. We went through a box flat, 

 to find an Owlet Nightjar's {Jigotheles novce-hollandice) nest, contain- 

 ing downy young, in a leaf -lined hollow. These little birds present 

 a curious appearance, as the white down that clothes them when 

 they emerge from the shell still adheres to the feather tips until 

 they are nearly fledged. In a bracket-shaped hollow of a box, 

 low down, an Oreoica had placed her nest. It was occupied by 

 three young birds ; feathers just sprouting, eyes open, down per- 

 sisting on the forehead and nape and on the single dorsal feather 

 tract, also on the humeral and femoral. The anterior cervical 

 tract had no down, and divided on the chest and abdomen. 



We made for home, our way leading out of a series of box flats 

 on to a sandy open ridge covered with grasses and wild-flowers 

 (mostly everlastings) and flowering shrubs. We disturbed a 

 Brown Song-Lark (C. cruralis) from her nest in the grass (three 

 eggs). A Kingfisher {H. pyrrhopygius) was interrupted in his 

 efforts to knock the life out of a lizard against a dead limb. He 

 was so alarmed at our approach that he dropped the reptile and 

 flew to a safer perch, only to see us annex the lizard for our specimen 

 jar. These Kingfishers are not so noisy as the Sacred species, 

 their only call being a mournful piping note, frequently heard 

 during the mating season. 



Next day we made an early start for Coogee Lake, a large body 

 of water, about 6 miles in a south-easterly direction from camp. 

 We crossed a sand-hill into a large depression bordered on one side, 

 at first, by box, and containing a number of dead box stumps along 

 its bed. We found " Budgerigars" {Melopsittacus iindulaUts) breed- 

 ing for the first time during our trip ; most of the nests contained 

 only "commencing" clutches. Many Whitefaces' nests, with eggs 

 or young, were inspected, and a few Pardalotes' (P. ornatus). The 

 flat closed in somewhat as we neared the Coogee road, and we 

 found a nestful of young Many-coloured Parrakeets in a hollow 

 box. We came to a large box occupied year after year by a pair 

 of Pink Cockatoos (C. leadbeateri). Last year this hollow con- 

 tained a clutch of four eggs ; this year there were only three. 



