THE VICTORIAN NATURALIST. 195 



brood may be early or late ; in addition, the heavy part of the 

 latter district is colder than the former, and the breeding season 

 is slightly delayed and extended. After January the adults go in 

 pairs for a time, each couple keeping to its special hunting 

 ground. A few weeks later they are gregarious in their habits. 

 Mr. Graham has noticed that all keep well under green shelter 

 during the heat of the day, and visit the open during the early 

 morn or on dull or stormy days. The young males assume 

 a general likeness to the adult male parent during the following 

 February or March, but not before the third year are they 

 quite like each other, the red varying in intensity to a marked 

 degree, just as that of P. phcenicea, Gld. Like the latter species, 

 it moults its red in immediate favour of a fresh supply, so that a 

 Robin once red is always red. 



NOTES ON SOME DESERT BIRDS. 



By G. A. Keartland. 



{Read before the Field Naturalists'' Club of Victoria, \4.thJan., 1901.) 



In alluding to the birds of the great central desert of Australia it 

 is not my intention to refer to the Raptores, which possess 

 sufficient wing power to travel from the centre of the widest part 

 of the Great Desert to its margin in a few hours, but to those less 

 fitted by nature for sustained flight. The latter may be divided 

 into two classes — those which are indicative of the presence of 

 water, and those which appear to be quite regardless of its 

 existence. 



First of all let me say that the great central desert of Australia 

 covers an area of about 320,000 square miles, extending from 

 Sturt's Creek in the north to the Musgrave Range in the south, 

 and from Lake Augusta in the west to the overland telegraph 

 line in the east, which, with the exception of a comparatively 

 small area of pastoral country along the course of the Finke 

 River and in the western valleys of the Macdonnell Ranges, is 

 simply a barren waste of sand clothed with spinifex, and crossed 

 diagonally by numerous sandhills, which run from N.W. to S.E. 



Amongst the birds which indicate the proximity of water we 

 find the graminivorous birds, such as pigeons and parrots, which 

 always require a drink to soften the seeds swallowed before they 

 are passed into the stomach and digested ; whilst the Amytis, 

 Calamanthus, and Stipiturus have such short wings as to be 

 incapable of flying any great distance. Yet these three species 

 are found in the most arid portions of the desert, where no 

 indications of water exist. They are insectivorous, and doubtless 

 extract sufficient moisture from the food upon which they 

 subsist. 



By a study of the habits of the avifauna of a country the 



