220 -^/my Feathers. [JtprW 



mornino- than at any other period, when probably the coveted 

 sweetness would be thicker and sweeter than in the full heat of 

 the day. I have frequently speculated on the utility or necessity 

 of the brush tongue with which these engaging birds are 

 furnished, but never before have I noted them using it for 

 practical honey-eating purposes. — A. H. Chisholm. Mary- 

 borough (Vic), 1 6/ 1/09. 



* * * 



The Lyre-Bird at Poowong. — There is a matter in con- 

 nection with the nesting habits of the Lyre-Bird that has com- 

 pletely baffled any attempt on my part at a solution. It is 

 this : Is it regarded as an indisputable fact that each female 

 bird has her individual nest and lays an egg each year } All 

 the male birds that have come under my notice have invariably 

 had two or three females as consorts, yet I Can find no proof 

 that all three build nests and lay. On the contrary, consider- 

 able evidence is forthcoming to show that of their number only 

 one lays, though probably the others assist in incubation. I can 

 form no opinion of any value as to whether the male bird sits or 

 not, but hope to decide the matter next season by watching the 

 nest from daylight till dark. I have never known a male bird to 

 be flushed from a nest. A short distance from where I live 

 there is a patch of about two acres of the virgin hazel scrub, and 

 at least three Lyre-Birds live in it. Each year they breed, yet, 

 search as I will, only one nest can I find. A little further off is 

 another isolated patch of virgin scrub, containing about one 

 acre, and three females and one male bird inhabit it. This 

 season one nest was built in it ; last year there was but one, and 

 one only the year before. As a boy I did a good deal of trap- 

 ping and 'possuming in my spare time, and a favourite place to 

 set a "springer" was just where a wallaby would land after 

 leaping over a gully. The gullies then were always resorted to 

 by those engaged in trapping ; and as a gully is a favourite 

 nesting-place of the Lyre-Bird, it would naturally follow that the 

 trapper would frequently come across their nests. We used to 

 take quite a paternal interest in the ungainly young nestling, 

 and would every day lift it out of its feathery nest, and when it 

 called out the mother would soon appear beside us, greatly 

 disquieted. But of the father bird on these occasions we saw 

 very little; a flash through the undergrowth was all we would 

 ever see of him. I never knew the female to desert her young, 

 however much we handled it ; and I have often handled their 

 eggs in the nest, but the birds invariably returned to them. I 

 have also flushed birds from their nests after their eggs have 

 been handled by others. Mr. D. C. Miller, late of Nyora, told 

 me that he once examined an egg in the nest, and found that 

 the bird did not return to it, and it was ultimately destroyed by 

 a lizard. I have known a bird desert her nest before the tgg 



