350 BIRDS OF THE DISTRICT OF GEELONG 
This was once a common species in the Geelong 
district, but can hardly be said to be so any more. 
It is very local, never found in thick bush or in abso- 
lutely open country, but only in places w^hich are 
lightly timbered with gums interspersed with she-oaks, 
bull-oaks, or honeysuckles. It was formerly, and 
probably is still, to be found sparingly throughout 
the less dense parts of the woodlands between Port- 
arlington, St. Leonards, Queensclifl, Ocean Grove, 
and Drysdale. One meets with it again in a patch 
of timber on the Grass-tree Plain, and at intervals 
in the gum scrub which fringes the messmate forest 
about Jan Juc and Paraparap. At the foot of the 
You Yangs it is still numerous. 
No bird's-nest is easier to find than the Minah's, 
except on those rare occasions when, in the absence 
of its favourite trees, it resorts to the gums ; in these 
its nest is much less conspicuous. Ordinarily it 
chooses a low, projecting bough of a honeysuckle, 
bursaria, or she-oak, and makes a nest so large and 
with so much woolly adornment of the exterior that 
one can hardly miss it. It is open, and built, as to the 
main fabric, of wiry grasses ; within it is nearly always 
lined with a pad of sheep's wool, of which also strips 
are used to ornament the outside. 
The eggs are laid in August and are three in 
number, dull white in ground-colour and thickly 
spotted and blotched with red, especially towards the 
thicker end. 
The Minah flies comparatively slowly, though its 
