THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
fiading them unfit for blowing, etc., have replaced them carefully, and 
happening to return the same way, have been astounded to see the parent 
bird breaking them with great expedition.” 
Again MacLaine reported {E7nu, Vol. III., p. 191, 1904) : “ Cape Barren 
Geese are laying in large numbers this season. I have seen as many as 30 
nests on two islands. Last year it was almost impossible to get any eggs, 
which led one to think that the birds had departed elsewhere to breed, 
so we must attribute it to nature, which often ordains that both the 
animal and vegetable kingdom should be less prolific in some seasons than 
in others.” 
Mr. Frank S. Smith has sent me the following note : “ Although in a 
general way Cape Barren Geese may be said to all leave Victoria (I am speaking 
of the flocks that come to Victoria from the C.B. Islands) at the end of summer, 
returning to the islands, there are almost a few birds which remain here. I 
got the manager of a station where they always visit to watch particularly, 
and he writes me that the few that remain include wounded birds. The non- 
migrating birds spend the winter on the western plains, but appear quite out 
of their element and miserable, and when their mates come back from the 
islands at the end of spring, these stationary birds meet them with great excite- 
ment. So far as is known, these non-migrating birds never breed here. Of 
course it is proverbially difficult to prove a negative, but I fancy their nests 
would have been found or the young birds seen. I have no record of either. 
This goose is a common inhabitant of the western plains of Victoria, of course 
in the summer only, to which it migrates from its island homes. It commences 
its migration to the mainland of Victoria, in the end of September, and thej^ 
keep coming until the middle of December. In the earlier lots, it is easy to 
distmguish the young birds from the old, but the distinction soon dies away. 
The geese leave on the return journey towards the end of March. Campbell, 
and aU others whom I have seen, persist in referring to it as being of limited 
numbers. In one day, however, I counted two flocks, feeding on a bark, 
in which there were 124 and 136 birds respectively. This was in February, 
1907. In the summer (January) of 1906, I saw hundreds of the birds sprinkled 
(for over a mile) along a moist depression, a sort of dry watercourse. Both of 
these sights were seen near Streatham, in the heart of the plains. I have also 
seen smaller flocks on the banks of lakes and dams. So far as I know, these 
plains, from Geelong to Hamilton, are the sole Victorian habitat of the bird. 
I have noticed that the bird is curiously averse to swimming, and I have 
never seen wild birds doing so. I have seen them standing in the water, 
and playing in it, but always with their feet on the bottom. But I have 
seen wounded birds swim freely.” 
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