BLACK-HEADED PARDALOTE. 
creeks and watercourses. Under favourable conditions, nine days are occupied 
from the commencement of the burrow to the completion of the nest. The 
egg-chamber is invariably lined with coarse pieces of eucalypt bark. Two 
eggs are laid. Small insects gathered from the flowers of a Orevillea and 
eucalypts form the principal article of food, in collecting which the feathers 
of the throat and fore-head frequently become matted with honey and pollen. 
Lizards are responsible for the destruction of many nests.” 
Macgillivray recorded it as “ Numerous in the Gulf country and at the 
Jardine River,” using the name P. uropygialis. 
Campbell wrote of birds from the King River, Northern Territory: 
“ One <$, one $, one immature. There appears to be some uncertainty whether 
the Gouldian type-locality of this interesting species is Arnhem Land or North¬ 
west Australia. Gould, in his letterpress, states the latter locality, while 
his fine plate undoubtedly depicts birds from Port Essington. In the 
Territory specimens the lower back and upper tail-coverts are not ‘ chestnut,* 
but are more golden (cadmium-yellow), while the north-west birds have those 
parts fight cadmium, and the flanks and under tail-coverts are paler buff.” 
A little later, writing of the birds of Groote Eylandt, Campbell, through a slip 
of the pen, wrote “ Pardalotus rubricatus uropygialis ,” adding d ? ?. “ These 
specimens possess the golden (cadmium-yellow) upper tail-coverts typical of 
N.T. birds.” 
I don’t quite understand the reference to “ chestnut ” above in connection 
with the subspecies uropygialis. 
This distinct species shows definite variability geographically as can be 
recognised from the fact that the Western form was regarded as specifically 
distinct by Gould. He described the typical form from Moreton Bay, Queens¬ 
land, and reserving specimens from North-west Australia named them 
as distinct. Gould’s comparisons are worthy of requotation: “ P. melano- 
cephalus probably takes the place (at Moreton Bay) of the P. striatus, from 
which it is distinguished by the black colouring of its head and by its thicker 
bill, but to which it is very nearly allied, as well as to the P. uropygialis ; it 
is, in fact, directly intermediate between the two, having the black head of 
the latter without the yellow colouring of the rump. . . P. uropygialis 
is easily distinguished by the bright yellow colouring of the lower part of the 
back, by the rich spots of orange before the eye and by being more diminutive 
in size.” 
Ramsay, recording the bird from Derby, wrote: “ Several specimens 
of this well marked species; the sexes are alike in plumage. The young have 
the head mottled with brown, and the tips of the spurious wing-feathers of 
the same red tint as in the adult, the upper tail-coverts not so bright, but still 
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