GREY CROW-SHRIKE. 
name Bell. They are very destructive to fruit, especially to figs, which they 
eat wholesale, and show great cunning and skill when approached with a gun, 
often manoeuvring so that as one walks round a tree in order to get a clear 
view of the bird in it, the latter will also move so as to keep the trunk or a 
branch between it and its enemy. They are fairly common about Broome 
Hill, and on the Pallinup River to the south-east, at which locality I noticed 
these birds uttering a loud trumpet note. The nests are made of sticks, some- 
times quite small nests lined with grass, and are usually high up in a tree ; 
but east of Broome Hill, where the large timber decreases, they build in jam 
trees, 15 or 20 feet off ground. The chief breeding months are August to 
November. Clutch of eggs three. At Broome Hill, Sept. 8, 1908, two eggs 
incubated. Oct. 9, 1910. Several clutches of three eggs. Nov. 1, 1908. 
Fledged young. Dec. 12, 1910, near Lake Muir, fledged young.” 
Milligan wrote from the Margaret River district : 44 There were tens of 
thousands of Leaden Crow-Shrikes . • . this is one of the most numerous 
birds on the coast. He is locally known, and in fact, everywhere throughout 
the State, as the Squeaker. In springtime he seeks the coast to feast upon 
the land snails which are abundant on the coastal hills. In the south-west he 
is regarded as a 4 weather prophet,’ and the result of my own observations 
is that immediately preceding rain he drops his almost ceaseless clamorous 
call (which gives him his local name) and utters a musical double note at 
long intervals. On the occasion of my first visit they had not begun to build. 
On the occasion of the second visit they, in common with the Crows, were 
committing havoc in the homestead garden among the Cape gooseberries 
and figs. His aboriginal name is 4 Bella.’ ” 
Gibson recorded this species as 44 Common in the timbered country 
(between Kalgoorlie and Eucla), especially in the coastal districts ; not seen 
in the open country. Usually seen singly or in pairs, never together in numbers.” 
Whitlock, writing from the East Murchison, Mid-west Australia, states : 
44 Distinctly rare. I caught sight of a single bird at Bore Well, and also 
heard the notes of a pair near a likely looking nest in a tall gidgi tree. The 
situation of this nest was too dangerous to warrant an attempt to rifle it — 
a weak horizontal branch at a height of 35 feet, with the nest on the extreme 
end, out of reach of a scoop, and an outcrop of jagged ironstone rocks below. 
A broken limb in these lonely scrubs is a serious matter, the chances of timely 
assistance being remote.” 
Alexander noted it as : 44 Common at Bremer Bay, 100 miles from Albany 
on the south-west coast.” 
Capt. S. A. White on his recent tour in the Margaret River district 
apparently did not meet with them in 44 tens of thousands ” like Milligan, 
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