TROGGATT. O 



lagoons I liave found fifty mud turtles dead along a wire-netted fence betweea 

 them and the river. 



Other methods adopted for the destruction of the rabbits are affecting' tha 

 animals and birds of the west. The introduced fox is extending his range all 

 over the continent, and all ground nesting birds and animals are at his mercy. 

 Introduced starlings and sparrows are appearing in immense flocks, and are not 

 only eating up the food of our useful native birds, but occupying their nesting 

 places. 



Last, but not least, the value of the furs and skins of our marsupials, and tha 

 feathers of our birds is increasing every year, leading to the wholesale destruction 

 of many speries. Again, there is the motor boat used in the capture of wild fowl. 

 I have known of "sportsmen" with motor boats running down and drowning the 

 moulting black swans for sport! 



The motor car can outstrip the swiftest kangaroo or emu on the big plains 

 and is now often used for kangaroo hunting, when the hunted has not a sporting 

 chance of escape. 



Much of the destruction of wild life is unavoidable when we drain the swamps 

 and clear away the scrub and forest, if we are going to get the best returns for 

 our crops, and flocks and herds; but much could be avoided, and a great national 

 asset could be created under a scientific protection of our wonderful and prolific 

 native life. We have in our "Birds and Animals Protection Act, 1918," one of 

 the very best wild life protection Acts ever passed into law in Australia. This 

 Act was drafted and discussed by economic zoologists who knew what they were 

 doing: and though some of their suggestions were ruled oui in Parliament, it is 

 still far ahead of any Act previously passed. 



One of the strong points in the 1918 Act was the black-listing of only 

 noxious birds and animals; and a complete or partial protection of every other 

 bird and animal not specified in these two schedules. Yet in a Supplement of the 

 Government Gazette. January 8, 1919, upon whose authority T know not, a num- 

 ber of rare hawks have been added to the black-list of outlaws. Modern in- 

 vestigations regarding the feeding habits of hawks and owls have shown that 

 the little damage they do to game and the poultry yard is more than balanced by 

 the number of noxious insects, mice, and small reptiles they destroy. 



The rarity and beauty of several of these birds would alone have kept them 

 out of the black list if the authorities had consulted an economic zoologist. 



I also claim, and I think with sound reason, that such useful can-ion and 

 insect-eating birds as the crows, other similar birds, and our great eagle, should 

 only be proclaimed outlaws where they are attacking the ewes and lambs, and that 

 in other districts they should have the protection of the Act. 



In most of the United States all Scalp Acts have been repealed except those 

 against the pestiferous English sparrow. The fauna of Australia has been 

 greatly neglected from a commercial standpoint. Our Game Acts and Wild Life 

 Protection Laws are at the present time a great improvement upon those in 

 existence twenty-five years ago; yet the State is not getting the best value for its 

 wild animals and birds that are slaughtered and sold by hunters for their food 

 value, their skins, their fur or their feathers. Our wild life has been the sub- 

 ject of much legislation, and the definition of game has varied considerably in th". 

 successive game laws of all our States . 



In the Old World it has been much the same; but there, where so many 

 interests are involved, united action has been difficult, particularly where the 

 armies of migratory birds fly annually over half a dozen kingdoms. 



