January, 1939 
The Queensland Naturalist 
13 
were gathered together in the Bunya districts. When the 
final camping ground was reached, a man, the owner of 
the particular tree (where individual ownership existed), 
would climb a tree, detach a cone and examine it, and 
pronounce that everything was all right, and the feast 
would then begin. The trees would then be climbed when 
nuts were required and the cones knocked off. The nuts 
were eaten both raw and roasted in the camp fires. Some- 
times they were ground to a flour and used in that form. 
During a Bunya season, it is not to be understood 
that the Bunya nut provided all the food : on the contrary, 
wallabies, scrub turkeys, snakes, yams, fern rhizomes, and 
other naturally occurring foods, were eagerly sought after 
to supplement the high carbohydrate diet, and towards 
the end of the nut season, the animals, birds and other 
game began to get rather scarce, owing to the presence of 
the large population of aboriginals, and gradually the 
tribes would move off to other hunting grounds, the 
inland natives often going to the coastal territory of some 
friendly tribe for a while before returning to their own 
usual haunts. In this way, changes in diet were provided 
for the different peoples. 
At the Bunya feasts there were many social func- 
tions and new corroborees were acted for the benefit of 
other tribes, and were thus passed about the country later 
on. Kippa ceremonies were carried out often by several 
tribes combined, when the young men or “kippas” were 
painfully initiated into the status of manhood. Family 
feuds were sometimes brought to a head, resulting in a 
fight between the parties concerned; anybody killed was 
often eaten either wholly or in part by his relatives and 
friends, who thus hoped to become infused with the good 
qualities of the dead man. Finally, however, the Bunya 
nut supply being exhausted and the other foods becoming 
scarce, each tribe gradually made its way homewards, to 
return in three years’ time. 
The nuts themselves, when in plenty, were often pre- 
served for a time by burying them in the wet mud of a 
waterhole, where they were often left for some weeks be- 
fore being dug up and consumed. Many would then be 
mouldy and some sprouting, but were still considered 
edible by the natives. It is worth noting that there is an 
idea prevalent amongst the white population that the 
embryo of the seed is poisonous. This is erroneous, the 
embryo being quite sweet and innocuous. The cones were 
not allowed to fall and be collected on the ground, because 
only a small percentage would thus be recovered owing 
