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Transcriber's Note.
^ indicates a superscript.
_text_ indicates italic type.
=text= indicates bold type.
A missing line on Page 25 (_in italics_)
(Their wings are paddles, being flattened and devoid of quills.
_The wings are not folded, but are carried hanging awkwardly at_
the side.)
was restored from a different Edition on Google Books
(http:// books.google.com/books?id=Rn3uthhODo8C&pg=PA25&lpg=PA25).
Sundry damaged or missing punctuation has been repaired, and a few
index entries have been amended.
The use of hyphens was not necessarily consistent throughout this book.
In some instances there are subtle differences in meaning.
Some Australian/British spellings (e.g. coloured, defence, draught,
grey, learnt, lustre, etc.) have been retained, though color/colored
and gray are more prevalent. The Author has used various resources.
From Wikipedia:
"DR JOHN ALBERT LEACH (19 March 1870 - 3 October 1929) was an
ornithologist, teacher and headmaster in the state of Victoria,
Australia.
Leach was born in Ballarat, Victoria and educated at Creswick Grammar
School (where he was dux), Melbourne Training College (1890) and the
University of Melbourne, where he graduated B.Sc. in 1904, M.Sc. in
1906 and in 1912 obtained his doctorate for research in ornithology.
Leach was a regular writer and broadcaster on natural history subjects
and introduced it into the school curriculum. He was President of the
Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union (RAOU) 1922-1924 and Editor of
its journal The Emu 1914-1924 and 1928-1929. He was a member of the
British Ornithologists Union and a corresponding fellow of the
American Ornithologists Union. Leach was also member of the Field
Naturalists Club of Victoria. He was instrumental in founding the
Gould League of Bird Lovers in 1909 with Jessie McMichael. He is best
known as the author of An Australian Bird Book, the first edition of
which was published in 1911, and of Australian Nature Studies in 1922.
He also part-authored a series of Federal Geography books, and worked
on the Official Checklist of the Birds of Australia second and revised
edition, published by the RAOU in September 1926.
Leach had been preparing two books before his death, one of these was
a collection of weekly radio broadcasts he made on 3LO in the mid
1920s....
Among his contributions to ornithology was the relationship between
the Australian Magpie, butcherbirds and currawongs in the family
Cracticidae, now sunk as a subfamily into Artamidae."
This book is a field guide. The pages were divided vertically, with
the tabular matter on the top half, and the Lecture on the bottom half
of the page.
The ebook has been re-arranged so that the separate parts have a
smoother flow. The top parts of the pages have been left intact, but
the bottom parts have been collected together and moved, so that the
Lecture text for each ORDER precedes the tabular listing and
descriptions for that ORDER.
The only exception is for ORDER XXI.
ORDER XXI.--Perching-Birds--contains 11,500 species, more than
three-fifths of the world's 19,000 birds. It has been arranged into
sets of suitable groups of FAMILIES, to make it easier to access.
==== has been used to separate the Lecture from the Tabular matter.
From "PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.":
"In response to requests from beginners, a table has been added on
page 190. This table shows the page on which a bird of a certain size
may be found."
As the page numbers are an integral part of the field guide, and
necessary for the identification of birds seen in the field, in flight,
or found dead, they have been inserted into the tabular section, as
[Page xx].
Sometimes a page has contained the end entries of one ORDER, or one
Family, and the beginning entries of the next. In these few instances
(e.g. [Page 18a] and [Page 18b]; [Page 188a] and [Page 188b]), it may
be necessary for the reader to search both sections of the page.
For birds mentioned in the Lecture, it would be necessary to search by
bird name.
NAMES RECENTLY AMENDED (located after the INTRODUCTION).
It seems important to have these new names available, so they have
been added to (e.g.)
=20 Slate-breasted Rail= ....
as [~20 _Rallus pectoralis._]
so:
=20 Slate-breasted Rail= (Short-toed), Lewin Water-Rail,
_Eulabeornis (Hypotaenidia) brachypus_, A., T., Auckland Is.
=vt. Eur. Water-Rail.
[~20 _Rallus pectoralis._]
See also the explanatory notes in the PREFACE, and in the PREFACE TO
THE SECOND EDITION.
"The number at the right side of the page is the length of the bird in
inches (from the tip of bill to the tip of tail)." ...
so:
1
1
=2* Mallee-Fowl=, Lowan, Native Pheasant, Pheasant (e),
_Leipoa ocellata_, N.S.W., V., S.A., W.A.
Stat. r. _mallee scrubs_ 24
Like a small turkey; neck light fawn-gray; back, wings spotted
white, black, brown; f., smaller. Seeds, ants.
This means there is one genus of Mallee-Fowl in the world, and it is
found only in Australia. It is listed in this book as Bird number 2,
which has a colored illustration, indicated by the asterisk, *.
It is stationary (not migratory), rarely seen, lives in mallee scrubs,
and is 24" long.
It resembles a small turkey; its neck is light fawn-gray; its back
and wings are spotted white, black, and brown; the female is smaller;
and it feeds on seeds and ants.
Note (From NOTE following "PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION."):
A.--Australian Region (from Wallace's Line to Sandwich Islands
and New Zealand, see map p. 10).
'Sandwich Islands' is an old name for Fiji.
* * * * *
[Illustration: [2] [3] [4] [6] [8] [11] [14] [16]]
=2= Mallee-Fowl
=3= Stubble Quail
=4= Brown Quail
=6= King Quail
=8= Painted Quail
=11= Plain Wanderer
=14= Diamond Dove
=16= Bronzewing Pigeon
AN AUSTRALIAN BIRD BOOK
A Pocket Book for Field Use
BY
J. A. LEACH, M.Sc.
_First-class Honorman and University Exhibitioner and Scholar in
Biology; Organizing Inspector of Nature Study, Education Department,
Victoria; Member of the Council of the Royal Australasian
Ornithologists' Union; Vice-President of the Field Naturalists' Club
of Victoria; &c._
With Introduction by
FRANK TATE, M.A., I.S.O.
_Director of Education, Victoria._
_Published by arrangement with the Education Department
of Victoria._
SECOND EDITION
[Illustration]
MELBOURNE
Christchurch, Wellington, Dunedin, N.Z., and London.
WHITCOMBE & TOMBS LIMITED
1912
[Illustration: _The Queen City Printers_]
_Illustrations from Specimens (318) in the National Museum, Melbourne;
the balance mostly from Specimens in the Entomological Museum, C.
French (59), and in the collections of A. Coles, Taxidermist, (36),
C. F. Cole, and D. Le Souef. Twenty-two birds were photographed from
Gould's "Birds of Australia," five from drawings specially prepared by
C. C. Brittlebank, the well-known naturalist-artist, and one from the
Report of the Horn Expedition._
_Photos by Ralph L. Miller._
_Engravings by Patterson Shugg & Co., from Paintings by Miss Ethel M.
Paterson._
INTRODUCTION.
Nature-study in our schools is fast producing a generation of
Australians trained to look upon the characteristic beauties of our
Australian skies, our trees, our flowers, our birds with a passionate
appreciation almost unknown to our pioneering fathers and mothers.
It was natural that newcomers from the Old World should have been
impressed, and often unfavorably impressed, by the oddness of things
here. Rural sights to them had hitherto been sights of trim meadows
bordered by neat hedgerows, of well-cultivated fields and comfortable
farmsteads, or of stately homes set in fair gardens and far-reaching
parks of magnificently-spreading trees. What wonder, then, that they
were at first almost repelled by the strangeness and unfamiliarity
of their new surroundings! How could eyes accustomed to the decided
greens and to the somewhat monotonous shapeliness of the trees in
an English summer landscape find beauty all at once in the delicate,
elusive tints of the gum trees, or in the wonderfully decorative lines
of their scanty boughs and light foliage shown clear against a bright
sky? And so a land which is eminently a land of color, where
the ever-present eucalypts give in their leaves every shade from
blue-grays to darkest greens; where the tender shoots show brilliantly
in bright crimson, or duller russets, or bright coppery-gold;
and where tall, slender stems change slowly through a harmony of
salmon-pinks and pearl-grays, has been called a drab-colored land.
Even now, the beauty of the gum tree is not sufficiently appreciated
by Australians, and we see all too few specimens in our suburban
gardens. For an appreciation of the decorative effect of our young
blue gums, we must go to the Riviera or to English conservatories.
Australia has suffered greatly from phrase-makers. There is still much
popular belief that our trees are shadeless, our rivers are waterless,
our flowers are scentless, our birds are songless. Oddities in our
flora and fauna have attracted the notice of superficial observers,
and a preference for epigrammatic perfection, rather than for
truthful generalization, has produced an abundance of neatly-expressed
half-truths, which have been copied into popular literature, and even
into school books. Our English-bred poet, Gordon, writes of lands--
"Where bright blossoms are scentless,
And songless, bright birds."
and these lines are remembered better than his description in the same
poem of Spring--
"When the wattle gold trembles
'Twixt shadow and shine,
When each dew-laden air draught resembles
A long draught of wine."
It is true that we have scentless, bright blossoms; but Australia
is the home of the richly-perfumed wattle, and the boronia, with
its never-cloying fragrance; while there is, perhaps, no forest more
odorous than a forest of eucalypts. It is true, too, that we have
bright birds that have no excellence in song; but it is also true
that, in this favored land, there is a far greater proportion than
usual of fine song-birds.
The first generations of Australians were not taught to love
Australian things. We "learned from our wistful mothers to call Old
England home." Our school books and our story books were made in Great
Britain for British boys and girls, and naturally they stressed what
was of interest to these boys and girls. We read much about the beauty
of the songs of the Lark, and the Thrush, and the Nightingale, but we
found no printed authority for the belief that our Magpie is one of
the great song-birds of the world; we read of the wonderful powers
of the American Mocking-Bird, and did not know that our beautiful
Lyrebird is a finer mimic; we learned by heart Barry Cornwall's
well-known poem on "The Storm Petrel," and did not know that one of
the most interesting of Petrel rookeries is near the harbor gate
of Melbourne; and I remember well a lesson I heard as a boy on the
migration of birds, in which the teacher took all of his illustrations
from his boyish experiences in the South of England, and gave us no
idea that the annual migration of our familiar Australian birds to
far-off Siberia is a much more wonderful thing.
But all this is being rapidly changed. In the elementary schools
Nature-study is steadily improving, and children are being given an
eye for, and an interest in, the world of Nature around them. Our
school books are now written from the Australian standpoint, and more
use can, therefore, be made of the child's everyday experience. Field
Naturalists' clubs are doing much to extend the area of specialized
Nature-study, and their members are giving valuable assistance to the
schools by taking part in the programs for Arbor Day, Bird Day, and
the like. The growing interest in the Australian fauna and flora
is further evidenced by the frequent reservations by Government of
desirable areas as national parks and sanctuaries for the preservation
of Australian types. Last, but not least, is the production by capable
Nature students of special books on some form of Nature-study, such as
this Bird Book by Mr. Leach.
To our parents, Australia was a stranger land, and they were
sojourners here. Though they lived here, they did not get close enough
to it to appreciate fully its natural beauty and its charm. To us,
and especially to our children, children of Australian-born parents,
children whose bones were made in Australia, the place is home. To
them Nature makes a direct appeal, strengthened by those most powerful
of all associations, those gathered in childhood, when the foundations
of their minds were laid. The English boy, out on a breezy down, may
feel an exaltation of soul on hearing a Skylark raining down a flood
of delicious melody from far up at heaven's gate, but his joy is no
whit greater than his who hears, in the dewy freshness of the early
morning, the carol of the Magpie ringing out over an Australian plain.
To those who live in countries where the winter is long and bitter,
any sign that the genial time of flowers is at hand is very welcome.
All over the countryside the first call of the Cuckoo, spring's
harbinger, arouses the keenest delight in expectant listeners. This
delight is, however, more than mere delight in the bird's song. And to
those brought up with it year by year there comes a time when the call
of the Cuckoo stirs something deep down below the surface of ordinary
emotion. It is the resultant of multitudes of childhood experiences
and of associations with song and story. I first heard the Cuckoo in
Epping Forest one delicious May evening four years ago. It charmed me,
but my delight was almost wholly that of association. All the English
poetry I knew was at the back of the bird's song. Here in Australia
we have no sharply-defined seasons, yet I find myself every spring
listening eagerly for the first plaintive, insistent call of the
Pallid Cuckoo. For me his song marks another milestone passed.
Marcus Clarke wrote of the Laughing Jackasses as bursting into
"horrible peals of semi-human laughter." But then Marcus Clarke was
English-bred, and did not come to Australia till he was eighteen years
old. It makes all the difference in our appreciation of bird or tree
or flower to have known it as a boy. I venture to think no latter-day
Australian who has grown up with our Kookaburra can have any but
the kindliest of feelings for this feathered comedian. For myself, I
confess that I find his laughter infectious, and innumerable times he
has provoked me into an outburst as hearty and as mirthful as his own.
More than half of our pleasure is due to the fact that the bird is
"The same that in my schoolboy days I listened to."
and to such a one we can say--
"I can listen to thee yet,
Can lie upon the plain
And listen, till I do beget
That golden time again."
It is time that we Australians fought against the generally received
opinion that the dominant note of our scenery is weird melancholy.
This is the note sounded mainly by those who were bred elsewhere, who
came to us with other associations and other traditions, and sojourned
among us. It will not be the opinion of the native-born when they find
appropriate speech.
"Whence doth the mournful keynote start?
From the pure depths of Nature's heart?
Or, from the heart of him who sings,
And deems his hand upon the strings,
Is Nature's own?"
This little book should do much to popularize bird-study and to spread
a knowledge of our common birds among our people. I hope devoutly that
an effort will be made to give them suitable names. We should give
them names a poet or a child can use. A Chaucer poring lovingly over
his favorite flower, the daisy, could call it by a name which is
itself full of poetry. Even the unimaginative clown, Nick Bottom,
could sing of
"The Ouzel Cock, so black of hue,
With orange-tawny bill,
The Throstle with his note so true,
The Wren with little quill,
The Finch, the Sparrow, and the Lark,
The plain-song Cuckoo gray."
And a Burns can invoke the Throstle in lines as musical as the song of
the bird itself--"And thou mellow mavis, that hails the night-fa'."
But how shall an Australian bard sing of "The Red-rumped Acanthiza,"
or of that delightful songster, "The Rufous-breasted Thickhead"?
Australian Nature-poetry will be handicapped until our children give
names like "Bobolink," and "Chickadee," and "Whip-poor-will," and
"Jacky Winter," to our birds.
"Oriel," in the _Argus_, some time ago, showed how hard it is to write
of love's young dream in Australian verse.
"Sweetheart, we watched the evening sky grow pale,
And drowsy sweetness stole away our senses,
While ran adown the swamp the Pectoral Rail,
The shy Hypotaenidia philippinensis.
"How sweet a thing is love! Sweet as the rose,
Fragrant as flowers, fair as the sunlight beaming!
Only the Sooty Oyster-Catcher knows
How sweet to us, as there we lingered dreaming.
"Dear, all the secret's ours. The Sharp-tailed Stint
Spied, but he will not tell--though you and I
Paid Cupid's debts from Love's own golden mint,
While Yellow-Bellied Shrike-Tits fluttered nigh.
"The Honey-eaters heard; the Fuscous--yea,
The Warty-faced, the Lunulated, too;
But this kind feathered tribe will never say
What words you said to me, or I to you.
"The golden bloom was glorious in the furze,
And gentle twittering came from out the copses;
It was the Carinated Flycatchers,
Or else the black Monarcha melanopsis.
"That day our troth we plighted--blissful hour,
Beginning of a joy a whole life long!
And while the wide world seemed to be in flower,
The Chestnut-rumped Ground-Wren burst forth in song."
It surely would not be amiss if the Bird Observers' Clubs throughout
Australia, and the Royal Australasian Ornithologists' Union, enlisted
the aid of the State Education Departments, and endeavored to find out
what names the children use for the birds of their district. Executive
committees upon bird names are good; but a good name is not evoked by
arguments in committee. It ofttimes comes from the happy inspiration
of some child who loves the bird. At present the names given by
classifiers are often an offence. A few evenings ago I was charmed
with an unaccustomed song coming from out a big pittosporum tree in
my garden at Kew. I took careful note of the little warbler, and then
consulted Mr. Leach's _Descriptive List_. Judge of my satisfaction
when I found that my little friend was "The Striated Field Wren or
Stink Bird"!
The Australian boy is responding splendidly to the Nature-study
movement. Bird observers tell me that shy native birds, formerly
unknown near the haunts of men, are making their appearance,
feeling safer now from molestation. Nest hunting for the sake of egg
spoliation is happily becoming rarer, although children are developing
keener eyes for nests. To-day every country school has its nests
under loving observation for the purposes of bird-study and of
bird-protection. Walt Whitman might have been describing many a
Victorian school boy when he wrote--
"And every day the he-bird, to and fro, near at hand,
And every day the she-bird, crouched on her nest, silent, with bright eyes,
And every day, I, a curious boy, never too close, never disturbing them,
Cautiously peering, absorbing, translating."
This loving study must bear good fruit. If we believe the scientific
men, Australia is, _par excellence_, the land of birds, song-birds,
plumage-birds, and birds of wonderful interest, such as the Satin
Bower Bird. The collection of Australian birds in our National Museum
at Melbourne is certainly one of the finest sights of the city, and it
should be studied by all who wish to know how favored this continent
is in bird distribution. But we must get to know and to love our
feathered friends. Mr. Leach in his lecture has dwelt sufficiently on
the economic and scientific value of bird-study. Let me enter a plea
for bird-study as a source of aesthetic pleasure. Before our Australian
birds can be to us what the Thrush and the Blackbird and the Linnet
and the Lark and the Nightingale are to the British boy, we must have
a wealth of association around them from song and story. And this
association must grow up with us from childhood if it is to make
the strongest appeal to us. It can rarely be acquired in later life.
British birds owe much to the poets for the charm that surrounds them.
When I heard the Nightingale in England, although I had no association
with it gathered from my boyhood's days, I heard more than the bird's
song. I was listening to Keats and Wordsworth and Shakespeare as well.
There is something very fine in the thought that such bird songs go on
for ever, that these immortal birds are "not made for death," that
"The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown:
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path
Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home,
She stood in tears amid the alien corn."
The Nightingale's song, as a bird song, I thought disappointing.
I remember having the same feeling with regard to the Thrush and
Blackbird. The charm of their songs is largely in the associations
they evoke. Our city children are now growing up in familiarity with
these two birds, which are becoming as common in our gardens as in
England. And wherever they go they carry so much that is fine in
literature with them. But there has not yet been time for our native
birds to endear themselves to us. And so we hear only their song. Wise
Shakespeare says--
"How many things by season seasoned are
To their right praise and true perfection."
* * * * * * *
"The Nightingale, if she should sing by day,
When every goose is cackling, would be thought
No better a musician than the Wren."
He knows that to the song of the bird must be its appropriate setting,
and that when Nature has done her part there is still much to be
supplied by ourselves.
The outlook is, however, a hopeful one. Nature-study is bringing our
boys and girls into kindlier relationships with our birds; suitable
popular names will be forthcoming for them; our poets will sing of
them; our nursery rhymes and our children's tales will tell of them;
and the time will come when even the birds now trying so hard to
sing their way into our hearts, while cursed with the names of
"Rufous-breasted Thickhead" and "Striated Field Wren or Stink Bird,"
will mean to an Australian what "the Throstle with his note so true"
and "the Wren with little quill" do to an Englishman.
Mr. Leach's valuable little book is a powerful contribution to this
much-to-be-desired result.
FRANK TATE.
NAMES RECENTLY AMENDED
By Gregory Mathews.
_The following were not included in the text._
The numbers 70, 74, and so on refer to the numbers of the birds.
20 _Rallus pectoralis._
65-66 _Genus Thalasseus._
70 _Sterna fuscata._
74 _Catharacta._
75 _Catharacta parasitica._
76 _Morinella interpres._
80 _Lobibyx novae hollandiae._
82 _Squatarola squatarola._
83-89 _Genus Charadrius._
90 _Hypsibates_
95 _Numenius minutus._
96 _Limosa baueri._
97 _Limosa melanuroides._
98 _Tringa hypoleuca._
99 _Tringa nebularia._
100 _Arenaria leucophaea._
101 _Erolia ruficollis._
102 _Erolia aurita._
103 _Erolia ferruginea._
104 _Canutus canutus._
105 _Canutus magnus._
110 _Choriotis australis._
111 _Mathewsia rubicunda._
114 _Egatheus falcinellus._
117 _Egretta plumifera._
118 _Egretta timoriensis._
121 _Egretta nigripes._
122 _Demigretta sacra._
124 _Ixobrychus pusillus._
126 _Chenopis atrata._
132 _Tadorna tadornoides._
134 _Nettion castaneum._
139 _Nyroca australis._
140 _Oxyura australis._
142-146 _Genus, Carbo._
157 _Astur cirrhocephalus._
171 _Ieracidea berigora._
172 _Ieracidea orientalis._
179-183 _Genus, Tyto._
185-187 _Genus, Glossopsitta._
191 _Genus, Callocephalon._
192-194 _Genus, Cacatoees._
195 _Licmetis tenuirostris._
196 _Calopsitta novae-hollandiae._
198 _Polytelis anthopeplus._
208 _Neophema chrysostoma._
213 _Lathamus discolor._
225 _Eurostopodus albigularis._
228 _Apus pacificus._
229 _Cuculus pallidus._
232 _Misocalius palliolatus._
PREFACE.
This little volume is intended as a pocket book for field use, so
that the many teachers, nature-students, nature-lovers, schoolboys,
schoolgirls, and boy scouts, who like to "_see_ what they _look at_,"
may be able to name the birds they meet.
The first step towards knowing the birds is a _desire_ to know them;
this will grow if a person is interested; so our first business, as
in all nature-study work, is to arouse _interest_. Interest follows at
once, as we have often found, if a person realizes that what is about
him or her is worthy of study.
To arouse this necessary interest, a lecture on Australian birds is
given in such a form that it may be repeated, if desired.
The second requisite is a handy descriptive list of the birds that are
likely to be seen. This has been written in simple language, so that
the schoolboy and non-expert can use it.
Thus, our aims are two:--
1. To show that Australian birds are of interest.
2. To supply, in a convenient form, a list of the birds which
are likely to be seen, and the marks by means of which they
may be identified.
This little book contains illustrations and descriptions of--
100% of the birds found in Victoria.
92.5% .. .. .. .. .. .. .. South Australia.
87.3% .. .. .. .. .. .. .. Tasmania.
82.5% .. .. .. .. .. .. .. New South Wales.
78.16%.. .. .. .. .. .. .. W. Australia (S. and C.).
78.15%.. .. .. .. .. .. .. Queensland.
The balance of those found in each of the other States is made up
mainly of birds closely related to those of which illustrations are
given, or of very rare birds restricted to a small area.
The families of the birds of the world have been included, so that the
observer can see where the bird he is observing is placed amongst the
world's birds. He will also be enabled to place near its Australian
relatives birds he reads about. The Australian birds only are grouped
in orders.
Mr. H. Wilson, Nature-study Lecturer, Training College, superintended
the painting of the birds, and saw the book through the press.
_A Hand-List of Birds_: Dr. Sharpe; and _A Hand-List of the Birds
of Australasia_: Gregory M. Mathews, have been followed for
classification and distribution.
But for the interest of the Minister of Education, the Hon. A. A.
Billson, and the Director, Mr. F. Tate, M.A., I.S.O., this little
book would not have been possible. Further, Mr. Billson suggested the
colored illustrations, while Mr. Tate has written the introduction,
read the proof-sheets and assisted at all stages.
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.
In response to requests from beginners, a table has been added on page
190. This table shows the page on which a bird of a certain size may
be found.
Pending the completion by the Royal Australasian Ornithologists' Union
of its official _Check-list of the Birds of Australia_, the scientific
names have been left as in the first edition.
NOTES.
Where one number is placed over another at the left side of the page,
the lower number denotes the number of species of that genus found in
the world; the upper denotes the number of species found in Australia
and Tasmania.
The number at the right side of the page is the length of the bird in
inches (from the tip of bill to the tip of tail).
The families of birds known are numbered consecutively, thus, F. 11,
F. 12, and so on. The number after a family name denotes the number of
species recorded from Australia and Tasmania. The distribution of
the species of each family amongst the six zoogeographical regions is
shown thus:
F. 17. COLUMBIDAE (2), WOOD PIGEONS, Passenger-Pigeon, Rock-Dove,
119 sp.--41(40)A., 25(17)O., 18(10)P., 19(17)E., 4(0)Nc., 24(20)Nl.
This should read: Family number 17 of the world's birds, COLUMBIDAE
(two of which are found in Australia and Tasmania) contains the Wood
Pigeons, including the Passenger-Pigeon (of North America) and the
Rock-Dove (of Europe). It comprises 119 species, of which 41 are found
in the Australian Region, 40 of them being confined to this region;
25 are found in the Oriental Region, 17 being confined to it; 18 are
found in the Palaearctic Region, 10 of which are not found outside
the region; 19 have been recorded from the Ethiopian Region, 17
being peculiar to that region; 4 have been recorded from the Nearctic
Region, none of which is restricted to the region; 24 have been
recorded from the Neotropical Region, 20 being peculiar to it.
The name in black type is the name accepted by the Australasian
Association for the Advancement of Science in 1898, and amended by the
"names" sub-committee of the Royal Australasian Ornithologists' Union,
1911. This name should be used to denote the bird. Many local names
are given, so that a person knowing a bird by one of these may
discover its proper name.
A.--Australian Region (from Wallace's Line to Sandwich Islands
and New Zealand, see map p. 10).
O.--Oriental (Indian) Region (India to Wallace's Line).
P.--Palaearctic Region (Europe, N.W. Africa, and Northern and
Western Asia, except Arabia).
E.--Ethiopian Region (Arabia and Africa, except N.W.).
Nc.--Nearctic Region. ("_The A.O.U. Check-List of North
American Birds, 1910_" has been followed in making this North
America, less Mexico).
Nl.--Neotropical Region (South America, with Mexico).
A.O.U.--American Ornithologists' Union; R.A.O.U--Royal
Australasian Ornithologists' Union.
A. denotes found throughout Australia; E.A. denotes found
in Queensland, N.S.W., and Victoria; S.A. denotes South
Australia; C.A. denotes Central Australia; W.A.
denotes Western Australia; N. Ter.--Northern Territory;
Mal.--Malaysia; Mol.--Molucca Is.; N. Cal.--New Caledonia;
N. Heb.--New Hebrides; N.G.--New Guinea; N.Z.--New Zealand;
Br.--British; T.--Tasmania.
Nom.--Nomadic; Mig.--Migratory; Part. Mig.--Partly Migratory;
Stat.--Stationary; exc.--except; acc.--accidental.
C.--common; v.c.--very common; r.--rare; v.r.--very rare;
u.--unlikely that the ordinary observer will see it.
* means see colored illustration.
f.--female; m.--male; f., sim.--f. is similar in color and
size.
=vt. Eur. denotes that the Australian bird is closely similar
in form, habits, &c., to the corresponding European bird.
=vt. cos. denotes that it is the equivalent or representative
of a cosmopolitan group of birds.
1
4
=6* King Quail= (Chestnut-bellied, Least, Dwarf), reads "No. 6
(see colored illustration) is the King Quail, called also the
Chestnut-bellied Quail, Least Quail, and Dwarf Quail. Four of
this genus are known in the world, of which one is found in
Australia."
(e) denotes that a name is used in error.
* * * * *
A Yellow-tailed Tit-Warbler is about 4 in. long; a White-eye, 4.5 in.;
a Sparrow, 5 in.; a House-Swallow, 6.5 in.; a Sordid Wood-Swallow,
7 in.; a Black and White Fantail, 7.5 in.; a Starling, 8.5 in.;
a Harmonious Shrike-Thrush, 9.5 in.; a Noisy Miner, 10 in.; a
Magpie-Lark, 10.5 in.; a Butcher-Bird, 11 in.; a Pallid Cuckoo, 12in.;
a Rosella, 12.5 in.; a Galah, 14 in.; a Wattle-Bird, 14.5 in.;
a Laughing Kingfisher, 17.5 in.; a White-backed Magpie, 18 in.; and a
Crow, 20 in. (measured from the tip of tail to the tip of bill).
Don't try to judge a bird's length in inches.
Note one or two prominent markings, and the size of a bird; say,
larger than a Starling, but smaller than a Magpie-Lark. Then get the
length of these birds from the table above (8-1/2 in. and 10-1/2 in.
respectively), and compare the description of each bird that comes
between these lengths with the illustrations and the bird before you.
The birds are approximately relative size on each block.
Use the index to find the page of a bird, then use the number, if
asterisked, to find the bird in the colored plate index.
[Illustration: THE WORLD Showing REGIONS]
=An Australian Bird Book.=
* * * * *
A LECTURE.
Australia is the wonderland of the scientist and of the Nature-lover.
It is a great living "museum," stocked with marvels of many kinds,
including so-called "living fossils," the sole survivors of otherwise
extinct groups of animals.
Competent authorities have proposed to divide the world, biologically,
into two parts--Australia and the rest of the world, and they have
considered Australia the more important part.
This division was based mainly on the study of mammals--animals which
suckle their young--for Australia is the home of the two surviving
members of the lowest group of mammals--Monotremata, the egg-laying
Platypus (_Ornithorhynchus_), and the Spiny Ant-eater (_Echidna_).
Further, marsupials, except for two kinds found in America, are
confined to this long-isolated southern land.
Here, shut off from the severe competition experienced by the animals
of northern lands, marsupials were modified so that they were adapted
for life in almost every realm utilized by the higher mammals of other
countries. Thus there are herbivorous, carnivorous, and insectivorous
marsupials. Owing, probably, to the advent of Bats--true flying
mammals--at, possibly, a comparatively early time, the marsupial was
beaten in the air, and so a true flying form was not evolved, though
the so-called "Flying Phalanger" is some distance on the way.
As regards the other group of flying animals--birds--Australia is even
of greater interest, for here are found unique archaic forms of life,
such as the Emu, Cassowary, Mound-Builders, and Lyre-Birds, and
"every widely-spread family of birds but two is represented; the only
widely-spread families of birds totally absent from Australia
are Woodpeckers and Vultures." Woodpeckers, however, have crossed
Wallace's line into Celebes and adjacent islands, and may yet reach
Australia naturally.
Further, many well-known birds, such as Pigeons, Parrots, and
Kingfishers, reach their highest development in the Australian region,
and, more important still, the whole bird world seems to reach its
culminating point in this wonderland. It is a factor adding to the
interest of Australia's fauna that three of the four families placed
at the head of the bird world in the natural system of classification
adopted by ornithologists, and used by Dr. Sharpe in his just recently
completed _Hand-List of Birds_, should be absolutely confined to the
Australian Continent and adjacent islands. Thus Australia can justly
claim to be the most highly developed of regions, so far as birds
are concerned, for Bower-Birds, Birds of Paradise, and Bell-Magpies
(_Streperas_) are peculiar, while the penultimate family--the Crow
family--is shared with the other regions of the world.
Thus, with regard to birds, the term "fossil continent" applied to
Australia is not appropriate, as it is but partly true.
Since the birds native to Australia are so interesting in themselves,
and are so varied in kind, Australians should know, love, and
jealously protect these beautiful creatures. Strict regulations should
be framed to prevent the exploitation of Nature's gifts by those who
destroy useful or precious and rare birds for the sake of gain. Even
collectors, who, under the guise of scientific work, collect eggs, and
kill birds to trade in their skins, should be supervized.
Let us now consider the different groups of birds. Living birds were
formerly divided into two sub-classes--(1) _Ratitae_ (Lat., _ratis_, a
raft), and (2) _Carinatae_ (Lat., _carina_, a keel). The first is
the small group of flightless, running birds, made up of five living
birds, all inhabiting southern lands. These are the Emu and Cassowary
of Australia, the Ostrich of South Africa, the Rhea or South American
Ostrich, and the Kiwi or Apteryx of New Zealand. Taken together with
other evidence, all pointing in the same way, these birds have led
scientists to think of a great southern land mass connecting the
southern lands, for the Emu did not fly here, nor did the Rhea fly
to South America, but they must have reached their present home by a
land-bridge not necessarily complete at any one time. As these birds
do not fly, they have no big wing-muscles, and so do not need the
ridge of bone down the breast. Thus they belong to the sub-class, the
members of which have a raft-like breast bone. The other living birds
were placed in the sub-class the members of which have a keel on the
breast bone for the attachment of the wing-muscles.
Recently, however, Pycraft, a leading ornithologist, has proposed to
base the division into sub-classes on the characters of the bones of
the palate instead of those of the breast-bone. Thus, he places the
sixth family of birds--the Tinamous, of South America--with the ratite
birds, to form his primitive group--_Palaeognathae_ ("old jaw"), while
the members of the old sub-class _Carinatae_, minus the Tinamous,
constitute his second division, the _Neognathae_ ("new jaw").
Mr. Gregory Mathews, the first part of whose projected great work
on Australian Birds has just come to hand, has followed Dr. Bowdler
Sharpe in accepting this classification, so we must follow too, as
Mathews' work will probably be our standard for years to come. The
large number of Australian birds belonging to this second sub-class is
now divided into 20 orders, which with the Emu order, make a total of
21 orders of birds represented in Australia.
Now, let us consider the birds in each order. The best-known member
of the first Australian order is the Emu, a bird well known to all,
though, unfortunately, becoming very rare, so that few persons in the
settled districts now enjoy the privilege of seeing an Emu in a wild
state.
====
[Page 12]
[Illustration: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]]
CLASS.--AVES.--BIRDS.
Sub-Class I.--Palaeognathae.
Ratitae and Tinamidae.
F. 1. _Rheidae_, Rhea, 3 sp. Nl.
F. 2. _Struthionidae_, Ostrich, 4 sp.--4(3)E., 1(0)P. (S.
Palestine).
ORDER I.--CASUARIIFORMES.
F. 3. DROMAEIDAE (1), EMU, 1 sp. A.
1
1
=1 Emu=, _Dromaius novae-hollandiae_, A.
Stat. r. plains 78
See diagram, second largest living bird; f., smaller. Fruits,
grass.
F. 4. CASUARIIDAE (1), CASSOWARY, 17 sp. A.
F. 5. _Apterygidae_, Apteryx, Kiwi, 6 sp. A. (N.Z.).
F. 6. _Tinamidae_, Tinamous, 69 sp. Nl.
Sub-Class II.--Neognathae.
Carinatae, minus Tinamidae.
====
The birds of the second order are well known as "scratchers." They
include the domestic fowl, which has been derived from the wild jungle
fowl of India, and other fowl, such as the peafowl. Quail are also
included here; so are Pheasants. The absence of Pheasants from
Australia is more than compensated for by the presence of the
Mound-Builders. These marvellous birds, Brush Turkeys and Mallee-Fowl,
retain the reptilian characteristic of not sitting on their eggs. Thus
the young have never known their parents. The eggs are laid in a huge
mound of sand and earth, which contains rotting vegetation. The
heat of decomposition in this remarkable natural incubator, is quite
sufficient to hatch the eggs. The young are born fully feathered, able
to run at once, and able to fly the day they leave the mound. Contrast
their stage of development with that of a pigeon born naked, blind,
and helpless, and that of a chick born clothed with down and able to
run about. There is an interesting connexion between the size of
an egg and the state of development of the young bird at birth. The
pigeon lays a relatively small egg, so the young pigeon does not
develop far in the egg, and requires much maternal care. The hen's egg
is larger, and the chick is more fully developed. The Mallee-Hen's egg
is enormous, and so the young can develop much further before birth.
This bird, unfortunately, is doomed to early extinction, for the
fox has discovered the rich store of food in the eggs, and country
dwellers have also discovered that they are delicate in flavor, and
are good food. It is hoped that the scrubby western end of Kangaroo
Island, where foxes are unknown, will prove a suitable sanctuary
for them. These birds, which rank among Nature's wonders, are almost
confined to the Australian region. One is found in Borneo and the
Philippines, while a second is confined to the distant Nicobar
Islands. Twenty-six live in Australia and its neighboring islands. One
of these has spread across Wallace's line to the small Kangean Island,
near Java. The Stubble Quail, a member of the Pheasant family, is
nearly identical with the British Quail. Mathews and Campbell make the
King Quail a sub-species of the Chinese Quail.
Quail are favorite sporting birds, but when one considers that they
are worth about 9d. each as table or game birds, and that sportsmen
found at Birregurra, that the crops of Quail were full of crickets,
and at Kerang the Quail contained numbers of a species of weevil, it
is doubtful if it is wise policy to shoot this insect-eating bird.
Although it may be worth a few pence as a table bird; it is worth many
shillings as a pest destroyer.
====
[Page 13]
ORDER II.--GALLIFORMES.
F. 7. MEGAPODIIDAE (4), Mound-Builders, Scrub-Fowl, Brush
Turkey, Megapode, 28 sp.--27(25)A., 3(1)O.
1
1
=2* Mallee-Fowl=, Lowan, Native Pheasant, Pheasant (e),
_Leipoa ocellata_, N.S.W., V., S.A., W.A.
Stat. r. _mallee scrubs_ 24
Like a small turkey; neck light fawn-gray; back, wings spotted
white, black, brown; f., smaller. Seeds, ants.
F. 8. _Cracidae_, Curassows, Guans, 59 sp.--1(0)Nc., 59(58)Nl.
F. 9. _Tetraonidae_, Grouse, Capercailly, Ptarmigan,
Prairie-Fowl, 45 sp.--1(0)O., 19(16)P., 28(26)Nc.
F. 10. PHASIANIDAE (6), Pheasants, Partridges, Peafowl,
Domestic Fowls, 242 sp.--12(10)A., 137(119)O., 47(31)P.,
64(58)E.
1
6
=3* Stubble Quail= (Pectoral), _Coturnix pectoralis_, A., T.
=vt. Eur. Quail.
Nom. c. _stubble_, _grass_ 6.7
Brown lined white, black; throat dull reddish; breast streaked
black; f., less distinctly marked with black. Weed-seeds,
insects. Rises with a burr-r-r.
3
7
=4* Brown Quail= (Swamp, Partridge), _Synoicus australis_,
N.G., A., T. =vt. Eur. Partridge.
Nom. c. _grassy flats_ 6.5
Upper finely-barred gray, black, chestnut; under buffy-gray
with zigzag black bars; bill blue, tipped black; eyes orange;
f., sim. Seeds, insects. "Bee'e quick."
=5 Tasmanian Quail= (Silver, Greater-Brown), _S. diemenensis_,
V., T. Like 4, but larger.
Nom. r. occ. _thick grass_ 8.5
[Page 14]
[Illustration: [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11]]
1
4
=6* King Quail= (Chestnut-bellied, Least, Dwarf, Swamp),
_Excalfactoria chinensis lineata_, Philippines, Sumatra to A.
exc. W.A.; sub-species of Chinese Quail.
Nom. r. _swamps_ 4.5
Back dark-brown; breast blue-gray; abdomen chestnut; throat
black, white bands conspicuous; 1-1/4 oz.; f., dark-brown,
spotted black; throat whitish; under barred black. Weed-seeds,
insects.
F. 11. _Numididae_, Guinea-Fowls, 23 sp. E.
F. 12. _Meleagridae_, Turkeys, 5 sp.--4(2)Nc., 3(1)Nl.
F. 13. _Odontophoridae_, American Quails, Bob-Whites, 72
sp.--18(10)Nc., 62(54)Nl.
====
Order III. comprises the 26 Bustard Quail and the peculiar Australian
Plain Wanderer. Only the last species of this Bustard Quail family,
the Australian Plain Wanderer has the hind toe. The females of this
order of birds do the fighting.
In Quail, the rule often observed amongst birds that the male is
larger and more beautiful than the female may be reversed, for here
the female is sometimes larger and the more conspicuously colored. In
association with this reversal of color and size, the domestic habits
are changed, for, in some species at least, the female sits on
the eggs but a very short time; the male then finishes the task of
incubating, and brings up and educates the young family. Meantime, the
female has found another mate and another clutch of eggs is left to
the care of the male.
In birds having both sexes the same color each bird usually does its
share of domestic work, sitting on the eggs, feeding the young, etc.
Where the male is more brightly colored, he, as a rule, does not
sit on the eggs, for he would be visible to a bird of prey sailing
overhead, and so would probably be killed and the eggs taken. The
great naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, thus regards the quiet
coloration of most female birds as a protection during the nesting
season. The gaudy coloration of many male birds has been explained by
Darwin as being due to sexual selection, the female choosing as a mate
the most gaily colored or most attractive bird.
Though the sitting bird is usually protectively colored, it was our
good fortune, on a Summer School excursion, attended by His Excellency
the Governor (Sir Thomas Gibson-Carmichael), a keen Nature-lover,
and the Director of Education (Mr. F. Tate), to find the
gorgeously-colored male Golden-breasted Whistler (Thickhead) sitting
on the eggs in full daylight. It was noted, however, that the open
nest was unusually well protected by an overhead bushy branch.
====
[Page 15]
ORDER III.--TURNICIFORMES, HEMIPODES.
F. 14. TURNICIDAE (8), Button (Bustard) Quail, 27
sp.--14(14)A., 9(6)O., 3(0)P., 4(4)E.
7
26
=7 Red-Backed Quail= (Black-backed, Orange-breasted), _Turnix
maculosa_, Cel., N.G., N.A., E.A., S.A.
Nom. r. _marshy_ 7
Back brown; crown blackish; sides, breast large black spots;
abdomen lighter; no hind toe; f., larger. Weed-seeds, insects.
=8* Painted Quail= (Speckled, Butterfly), Varied Turnix, New
Holland Partridge (e), _T. varia_, A., T.
Nom. r. _sandy_ 8
Upper rufous-brown with buff, black lines; breast, face
spotted; no hind toe; f., larger. Weed-seeds, insects.
=9 Red-chested Quail= (Chestnut-breasted, Yellow), _T.
pyrrhothorax_, A. exc. W.A.
Nom. v.r. _marshy_ 6
Upper dark-brown with buff, black lines; breast sandy-red;
abdomen whitish; no hind toe; f., much larger, brighter.
Weed-seeds, insects.
=10 Little Quail= (Dottrel, Swift-flying, Button), _T. velox_, A.
Nom. c. _open plains_ 5.5
Upper rufous with chestnut, black lines; breast rufous;
abdomen white; no hind toe; f., much larger. Weed-seeds,
insects.
1
1
=11* Plain Wanderer=, Turkey Quail, _Pedionomus torquatus_, A.
exc. W.A.
Mig. r. _grass_, m., 4.8; f., 6.3
Brown; broad black, white spotted collar; light band on wing;
breast chestnut; hind toe; m., smaller, paler, faint collar.
Weed-seeds, insects.
F. 15. _Pteroclididae_, Sand-Grouse, Rock-Pigeons (e), 17
sp.--7(2)O., 8(1)P., 12(7)E.
====
In Order IV. come those well-known birds--the "Cooers," Pigeons and
Doves. The Australian region is the great stronghold of these often
beautiful birds. It is only in this region that members of each of the
five families of living Pigeons are found. Two of the five families
are peculiar to the region, and nearly half the kinds of Pigeons known
are found here. The finest and largest of all Pigeons are the large
Crowned Pigeons of New Guinea. Unfortunately, the heads of these
Pigeons are much in demand for millinery. Would that fashionable women
knew the cruelty and devastation wrought by such fashions!
Amongst the most beautiful of Pigeons are, as Dr. Newton remarked,
the common Bronzewing Pigeons of Australia and Tasmania. The lovely
Fruit-Pigeons of East Australian scrubs are, perhaps, the most
beautiful of all, so it will readily be seen how fortunate we are with
regard to these birds.
The fine large Wonga-Wonga Pigeon is becoming rare. Its flesh is
white, so Gould named it _Leucosarcia_ (white flesh). It has been
proposed to introduce this bird into Europe to breed for table
purposes.
====
[Page 16]
[Illustration: [12] [12^A] [13] [14] [15] [16]]
ORDER IV.--COLUMBIFORMES, PIGEONS, DOVES.
F. 16. TRERONIDAE (8), FRUIT-PIGEONS, 228 sp--159(155)A.,
60(56)O., 1(1)P., 12(12)E.
2
2
=12 Topknot Pigeon=, _Lopholaimus antarcticus_, E.A., T.
(acc.) "Quook-quook."
Stat. c. _thick brushes_ 17
"This noble pigeon;" under silvery-gray; upper dark-gray;
crest rust-red; eyes orange; f., sim. Native fruits.
[Page 17]
F. 17. COLUMBIDAE (2), WOOD-PIGEONS, Passenger-Pigeon,
Rock-Dove, 119 sp.--41(40)A., 25(17)O., 18(10)P., 19(17)E.,
4(0)Nc., 24(20)Nl.
F. 18. PERISTERIDAE (15), GROUND-PIGEONS, Turtle-Doves, 198
sp.--61(55)A., 21(8)O., 10(1)P., 32(30)E., 10(0)Nc., 86(76)Nl.
1
6