Cockatoos. Leadbeater s Cockatoo. *- 
_,____ 7 
They lay their eggs white, and two in number—in holes of trees, sometimes in hollow 
limbs, and, as deep down as five or six feet from the opening, or in fissures of rocks; convenient 
clifts being sometimes resorted to by thousands of birds in the breeding season. Mr. Sturt says 
they “ build in vast numbers in the Murray clifts, making them ring with their wild notes, and 
in that situation are out of the reach of the natives.”* Mr. Caley notes that they make what the 
natives call “co-tora” in adjoining trees, that is, bark stripped off the smaller branches, and cut 
up into small pieces ; this, lying in conspicuous heaps, the locality of the nest is discovered. At 
Moyston, in the Ararat district, two birds, belonging to different owners, paired for several years, 
and had their nest in a dead tree just outside the village, where the eggs were laid; but, from 
some cause or other, they were not successful in their laudable endeavours to bring up a family. 
When the breeding season was over, they returned to their respective masters. As I write 
this paper, the month being September, my neighbour s cocky is violently courting one of the hens 
in my poultry-yard; indeed, sometimes the poor thing seems quite plagued, for she certainly does not 
return the advances of her would-be bridegroom, though he displays himself to the very best advanage, 
and has learnt her language to perfection. 
They are moderately long-lived birds. I have known them attain the age of twelve or fifteen 
years, thongh it is quite likely that they live even much longer than that. 
Description .—Plumage generally pure white; crest bright sulphur-yellow; ear-coverts, under 
surface of basal, half of primaries, both upper and under inner webs of secondaries and tertiaries nearly 
to the tips, a lighter sulphur; in some cases the under web of the tail feathers the same; the basal 
portions of all the feathers about the head and neck tinged more or less, with sulphur, which may be 
observed by turning them up; irides, black; orbits, white; bill, black ; feet, brownish-black. 
Size —length, 19 in. ; wing, 13 in. ; tail, in. ; tarsi, J in. ; bill, 1^ in. 
LEAD BEATER'S COCKATOO. 
Plyctolophus Leadbeateri (Vig.) 
Synonyms.— Cacatua Leadbeateri (Gould); Plyctolophus erythropterus (Swain.); Lophochroa Leadbeateri (Bonap.) 
Trivial Names. —Leadbeater’s Cockatoo ; Sir Thomas Mitchell’s Cockatoo ; Pink Cockatoo ; Tricolored Cockatoo ; Inca. 
Aboriginal Names. —Yel-le-lek (Wimmera) ; Cal-drin-ga (Lower Murray) ; Jak-kul-yak-kul (Western ustra xa.) 
Derivation. —Leadbeateri, in honor of Leadbeater, who first introduced the bird to London. . 
Habitat— What may be called the central portion of the southern half of the Australian continen ' Clie y ^ " 
immediately north of Vitoria in New South Wales, and in that parallel of latitude even as far as Western M h Mr. Gou d 
stating that it commonly visits Toodyay, this being at the junflion of the Swan and Avon R.vers W-tem Austraha.^ It have 
met with it pretty abundantly about the edges of the Mallee scrub (Eucalyptus durnosa), 1 . ur n i j 
Gray in latitude a 9 deg. south, and stating that it is a frequenter “ of the pine forest (calUtnspyramdaHs) near Gawler Town, 
found wherever that tree abounds.”t 
d , . N 1 of the prettiest sights I ever remember to have seen in connection with the binl-lnc of 
r M Australia was on a spring afternoon on the banks of Lake Benanee, on the Lower Murray, 
near Boston. A lake worthy of memory in Australian history, as its shores were: heAn,, le- 
f field on which the Darling blacks had arrayed their forces, det.rnunately to dispute the 
. . • Pr»nr fellows ! they seem to have been 
ight of Sir Thomas Mitchell to pass through their ein or). . 
, 1 a , X7 w Headlv cower the new-comers were armed against 
>rave enough, but they soon learned with wha > 1 
# Sturt’s Central Australia. Appendix, p. 35- 
+ Ibid. Appendix, p. 3 6 - 
