THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
sight — in fact, no word-painting could give it accurately, for it was one of those 
things whose sublimity can only be realised by the eye. The bird when first 
observed might be one thousand paces distant, its altitude in the air two or 
three hundred yards. He swept forward with great speed — in short, I have 
never seen a Wedge-tail travelling so swiftly before. There was no flapping 
of wings. The whole performance was on a very gradually lowering line, 
whose terminus was a few feet directly above the game. On gaining that 
point he turned round, but before he accomplished that purpose, puss, 
springing from her cover, darted for a fence that had a 2-foot wall under 
its wires. The Eagle at once went in pursuit. The hare evaded him by 
running close to the wall — a favourite dodge with hares when chased by 
Wedge-tails. Eagles are now rare birds in the region where I was brought up. 
This clearance resulted from the free use of strychnine. Before the advent of 
that deadly poison our only means of coping with them were shot-guns, but 
if we had depended on them as engines of destruction Eagles would be 
plentiful now. In my boyhood’s days they could be writ down exceedingly 
numerous. Some of the squatters had used iron dog-traps ; one bird was 
shot minus a foot, which it was supposed to have left in the jaws of a trap. 
They are hard to kfil with loose shot ; if sitting with back towards the shooter 
their wings protect them, while if fired on directly in front, it takes strong 
going lead to reach vital parts. An overhead flying shot, I have found, is 
not effective.” 
I have italicised the statement, made from sixty years’ experience by 
one who utilised the poison, that strychnine alone is the reason of the rapid 
extinction of this bird. 
A note by Le Souef in the same place (p. 37) is worthy of reproduction : 
“ A pair of Wedge-tailed Eagles is generally to be seen on the summit of 
Buffalo Mountains. The surveyor, Mr. 0. A. L. Whitelaw, informs me that 
whenever he places a red flag as a trig-mark on a pole at the top of the Horn 
or the Hump, these Eagles tear the flags to pieces, often within two hours of 
their being erected. Whether the birds object to the flag because it is red 
I cannot say, but Mr. Whitelaw was going to place a white flag on the pole, 
hoping it wiU not share the same fate as the red ones. I saw the claw-marks 
of the birds on the pole when examining the torn remnants.” 
In the EmUf Vol. X., p. 121, 1910, Ingle, writing of the Birds of South 
Gippsland, remarks : “ This noble bird was numerous until three years ago, 
since when they have almost entirely disappeared. This disappearance is 
almost entirely due to the poisoning of carcasses of sheep, and to vandal 
sportsmen (?). Personally, I think that within a very short space of time 
the species will become extinct.” 
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