THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
“ Calyptorhynchus banksii. I have abundant reasons for stating that 
every portion of Australia yet visited by Europeans is inhabited by members 
of the genus Calyptorhynchus, and that at least six species are now known, 
each of which has its own peculiar limits, whence it seldom or never passes. 
The present species is the one with which ornithologists first became 
acquainted ; it is a native of New South Wales and Victoria, out of which 
colonies I have never known it to occur, its range appearing to be limited 
by Moreton Bay on the east and Port Philip on the south. It is not 
unfrequently seen in the immediate neighbourhood of Sydney and other large 
towns, and it alike frequents the brushes and the more open wooded parts 
of the colony, where it feeds on the seeds of the Banksice and Casuari?ice, 
but occasionally changes its diet to caterpillars, particularly those that infest 
the wattles and other low trees. The facility with which it procures these 
large grubs is no less remarkable than the structure of the bird’s bill, which 
is admirably adapted for scooping out the wood of both the larger and 
smaller branches, and by this means obtaining possession of the hidden 
treasure within. The Banksian Cockatoo is a suspicious and shy bird, and 
a considerable degree of caution is required to approach it within gunshot; 
there are times, however, particularly when it is feeding, when this may be 
more readily accomplished. It never assembles in large flocks like the 
White Cockatoo, but moves about either in pairs or in small companies of 
from four to eight in number. Its flight is heavy, and the wings are moved 
with a flapping, laboured motion ; it seldom mounts high in the air, for 
although its flight is somewhat protracted, and journeys of several miles are 
performed, it rarely rises higher than is sufficient to surmount the tops of 
the lofty Eucalypti, a tribe of trees it often frequents, and in the larger kinds 
of which it almost invariably breeds, depositing its two or three white eggs in 
some inaccessible hole, spout, or dead limb, the only nest being the rotten wood 
at the bottom, or the chips made by the bird in forming an excavation. The 
female and young birds of both sexes differ very considerably from the old 
male in the marking of their tails. 
“ Calyptorhynchus macrorhynchus. All the examples of this species that 
have come under my notice have been collected at Port Essington, where 
it is usually seen in small troops of from four to six in number. It has many 
characters in common with the Black Cockatoos of the south coast, but no 
species of the genus yet discovered has the bill so largely developed, which 
development is doubtless requisite to enable it to procure some peculiar kind 
of food at present unknown to us ; it assimilates to the C. banksii of New 
South Wales in the lengthened form of its crest, but differs in having much 
shorter wings, and in the mandibles being fully one- third larger. The females 
114 
