MOUND-MAKING BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3852, 21 November 1883, Page 4

MOUND-MAKING BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA.

The mound-makers arc members of a email family of birds peculiar to Australia and the neighboring islands as far as _ the Philippines and north-west Borneo. They aro allied to common domestic fowls, which they resemble iv appearance, but differ from them in never sitting upon their eggs. Somo of the family, like tho mul'-os of the Cclobcs, aud the Mrytpodius a'aUnai of Gilolo, Termite, and Bourn, deposit their eggn in the warm beach sand, just above lngit water, in holes 3ft or Ift deep, many birds laying in the same hole. The young birds work their way out of the s.md as Boon as hatched, and lookout for themselves without any help from their parents. Ihe most of the* family, however, lay their eggs in mounds of leaves, earth, stones, sticks, seaweed, and other rubbish, which tney scrape together with their large grasping feot, and also with their wings. Ibe mounds aro often Gft or Bft high and 2.,tt to 30ft in diameter. The eggs arc buried in tho centre of the mound, at a depth of 2ft or 3ft, and aro hatched by the gentle heat produced by tho fermentation of the vegetable matter of tho mound. Inhis " Alalay Archipelago," "Wallace says, "When I first saw "these mounds in the island of Lombock I could hardly believe that they were made by such large birds, but I afterwards met with them frequently, and have once or twice come upon the birds engaged in making them. They run it few steps backward, grasping a quantity of loose material in "one foot, and throw it along way behind them. AVhen once properly buried the eggs seem to be no more eared for, tho young birds working their wav up through tho rubbish and running off at once to the forest. They come out of tbe egg covered with thick downy feathers, and have no tail, although the wings arc fully developed." The Lombock birds are miscellaneous feeders; other species live exclusively upon fruit, The curious departure of the entire family of megapodid.e, or brush turkeys, in their breeding habits, from the usual habits of gallinaceous birds, Mr Wallace traces to their peculiar organisation. The eggs are extremely large for birds of their size, each egg completely filling tho abdominal caviiy. An interval of nearly two weeks is requirul beforo the successive eggs can be matured. Each bird lays six or eight eggs in a season, the timo between the first and the last being two or three months. Now, if these eggs wore hatched in tho ordinary way, _ cither the parents must keep sitting continualiy for this long period; or if they began I o sit only after the last o<sg was deposited, the first would be exposed to injury by the climate, or to destruction by tho large lizards, snakes, or other animals which abound in tho district, because such large birds must roam about a good deal in search of their food. "Here then," 3lr Wallace concludes, "we seem to have a case in which the habits of a bird may be directly traced to its exceptional organisation ; for it will hardly be maintained that this abnormal structure and peculiar food were given to the magopodidic in order that they might, not exhibit that; paternal affection or possess those domestic, instincts, so general in that class of birds, and which so much excite our admiration.

All the members of this curious family, whether laying their in boles in the sand or in 'mounds of their own making, would appear to be semi-nocturnal, thur loud wailing cries being heard late info the night, and'long before daybreak in Ihe morning. Tho are deposited apparently at night,—Sydney Town and Country.