THE BIBBS OF AUSTRALIA. 
Adult female. Similar to the adult male. 
Immature. General colour above rufous-brown, darker and inclining to slate-black on 
the top of the head ; sides of head blackish with narrow rufous margins to 
the feathers ; bastard-wing and primary-coverts uniform slate-grey with white 
tips ; quills similar to the adult, but paler ; fore-neck also paler rufous ; 
abdomen and thighs much more rufous ; under wing-coverts grey, edged with 
rufous ; axillaries uniform grey. 
Nest. A platform of sticks placed on a limb usually overhanging water. 
Eggs. Clutch, three to five ; white, with a greenish tinge inside ; axis 44-46, 
diameter 34-35. 
Breeding-season, January (Gould) ; October to January (Elvery) ; September (Savidge). 
Mr. Tom Carter sent a skin of this bird, saying : “ Not uncommon in 
the swamps and rivers in South-west Australia.” 
Mr. J. W. Mellor reports : “ On the Clarence, Tweed and Richmond 
Rivers of Northern New South Wales it is frequently met with, especially 
where the tide influences the water, as it delights to wade in the slimy mud 
in search for small crabs, etc., left exposed by the falling tide. It does not 
take to wing easily, but when it does it only flys a short distance and 
then alights again.” 
“ This bird was very numerous at the Dep6t Creek, remaining during 
the day in the trees in the glen ... It was the habit of these birds to 
fly from the glen across the plains to this lower water [about thirty miles 
away] where they remained until dawn, when they announced their return 
to us by a croaking note as they approached the trees. They collected in 
the glen about the end of April and left us.”* 
“ The Yellow-necked Bittern is exclusively an inhabitant of the man- 
groves from which it is not easily driven, for it readily eludes pursuit by 
the facility with which it runs over the mud beneath their roots for a long 
time and distance, and it must be very closely followed up before it can be 
forced to take wing.”t 
“ Was not uncommon in the South-west [of Australia], being met with 
singly or in pairs. It roosted by day in the trees overhanging the water.” :[ 
“ Like some of the other members of its tribe, this Bittern resorts to 
the same nest to lay again if previously robbed. ”§ 
“ Mangrove flats, the timbered margins of rivers and creaks and tree- 
lined lakes, swamps, and pools are its favourite haunts, situations that are 
favourable for it to procure small fish and insects, on which it subsists, 
the food varying according to the situations it frequents.”^ 
* Sturt, Narr. Exp. Centr. Aiistr., App., p. 52, 1849. 
•f Gould, Ha'iidh. Birds Austr., Vol. IT., p. 315, 1866. 
X Shortridge, Ibis 1910, p. 175. 
§ Campbell, Nests and Eggs Awtr. Birds, p. 966, 1901. 
q North, Ausir. Mus. Sp. Cat., no. 1, Vol. IV., p. 43, 1913. 
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