318



Sydney Porter—Notes from Australia



from the ground ; previously the nest was only 3 or 4 feet from

the ground, and all those I saw were not more than this distance from

the floor of the forest and readily accessible to a fox. Dingoes in the

remote districts also take a few, but these animals are rare now in the

forested areas. The forest fires no doubt take a toll of the young and

sitting birds.


We came upon one tragedy, a large quantity of Lyrebird’s feathers,

including some of the beautiful aigrette-like tail feathers, where

obviously the bird had been sprung upon by some carnivorous mammal

and taken away to be eaten, no doubt a fox.


Sitting one day in a hollow forest tree sheltering from a torrential

rain storm, I heard a Lyrebird calling and scratching only a few yards

away, but try as I might I was unable to see him. Eventually I was able

to creep up within a yard or two, but was still unable to see the bird for

the intervening undergrowth ; then there was a sudden alarm note, a

flash of silvery white, and I saw the underside of the tail of a male bird

as he quickly disappeared in the dense vegetation. Many times in the

forest on Mount Monda I saw but a momentary glimpse of a bird, and

I came to the conclusion that it was the shyest and most elusive bird

I’d ever tried to study in its native haunts. However, in the Sherbrook

Forest near Melbourne my acquaintance with this bird, though of short

duration, was much more intimate, for here this apparently elusive

creature was comparatively tame. The undergrowth was not nearly

so impenetrable as at Mount Monda. Soon after I arrived in the forest I

heard the loud melodious calls of the birds and we crept in the direction

of the sounds ; but it was rather difficult to know which sound to follow,

for after being on the track of one for a few minutes this would suddenly

stop and another would start in the opposite direction. Eventually

we saw one in the distance and I crept slowly up to it. It turned out

to be a young male, perhaps two years old, and also a hen bird. I crept

closer and closer hardly daring to breathe, for I knew from previous

experience how very wary these birds were . . . just a flash of brown and

the bird is gone . . . each moment I expected the birds to disappear ;

but no, they still stood their ground though they must have seen us

long before we saw them. At last I was within about twenty yards of

them, the hen moved away but the young male remained. I followed



