Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 - 1957), Tuesday 9 September 1930, page 9


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NOTE OF THE WEEK.

By DONALD MACDONALD.

issuing from Vera, away back in the Mallee Mrs. Rd le Mer ennnu makes some comments upon beekeeping which ought to learn vide ml Tree lent publicity because they help so many people who are naturally neither cruel and callous to readjust their viewpoint It women who keep birds in tippets says Miss MrLenii III could be persuaded to take i by his we view it the position and in the weather on motor s would they not discover that the enunciation they may find at the CM or so of the to me if all the cures who was often let for a life of free dom is just sim r --deathless

What is the Unction about a captives there is none for the enclosed Win keep a bud captive when with a shallow box -against it in the branch of a tree I feel I n 16 n in your own dear son and Mar tin on a pin of water md a full climbs on ships sailing assured that with quietness and patience you will in a little while five feathered friends in numbers coming to you with confidence To feel the chill from the peck of the tin bill as it takes food from your hand surpasses any pleasure that the poor captive in a cage

and co cr v told

'In The issue' for January, 1925, Mr Jones Polhill, of Perth, writes -' V bird in the band is- a pathetic thing either a limp and drooping bundle of feathers with a loose ruck and a glazed eye or else a quiz ei ing handful of fear, so fluttering and poignant that no sensitive hands can continue to be its prison walls But a bird in the bush' It is a very battery of life in little compass md in its own haunts skil fully masked from the marauder, there may be Ivncs md a love match and a breath catching beauty of live blue shells in that cupola of the ages "

OUTDOOR SPORTS

THE KANGAROOS LEAP

Only a little while ago a boy asked for some records of the height and distance covered by a leaping kangaroo In a conversation about kangaroo hatch, Captain R h Baker, of Larpent, ulm like a small mob of them, said that the original make of the herd when about three quarters grown cleared a fence 5ft the high and measurement of the tracks showed that from take off to finding it covered 24ft Day-the leap being slightly up hill

Captain Baker added that his late friend Sir If I am r, of Birregurra, told him of a remarkable leap carefully measured during a kangaroo hunt many years ago at Murroon With a fair sited log in the bay, and the leap slightly down hill the kangaroo-also a three-quarter grown male-covered 11ft 6in

SEA GRASS

i w Whitteron considers it strange that sea cribs are never to be obtained in a Melbourne fish shop and wonders whether there are any large ones on the Victorian coast in Moreton Bay Queensland they have the sand crab, and in the tidal rivers the so-called mud crab Both of these are very good to eat, especially

the sand crib

On the Victorian coast, especially westward towards Portland We have the great red King crab years ago I had the shell of a giant specimen given to me by Mr Owen, a Queenscliff fisherman who got it on one of the islands in Bass Situate About Home I have speared cribs in the same sea pools as the cray fish were scarce In but although very sweet to eat, they are so much smaller than the crayfish that only an occasional large one is sent to market as a curiously

BOY 4M) GbV

I Bail, of Box Hill asks at what age a boy is allowed to use a shot gun That is a matter for his parents to decide as the law only forbids him to carry the small pea rifle if he is under 18 years of age because it is a weapon which seems to be a te., jet has often proved capable of killing a

Iran

If a very small boy were seen earning a shot gun of any kind a policeman might forbid him to lo ed for the sufficient reason that it was a danger to other pi opie Age does not determine just when a boy may be trusted with a gun because so much depends upon the boy

CTA 41 COAST SPORT

Those who have inquired lately about fishing and shooting camps on the Otway coasts at such places as Vase River and Port Campbell will

appreciate a thoughtful and sporting offer Mr J J S Tanner, of 53 Naples road, Mentone, offers I to give anyone interested the advantage of his knowledge of different spots, both about the nature of the sport and the best means of getting to

it

GENERAL TOPICS.

FEX MARKS.

1 was- asked about sex marks for the hen birds of the little Budgerigars parrots, and could give none, apart from the hen birds being rather smaller. ' El). (Essendon) says that one of the bird dealers in the Eastern Market told him that the little fringe of colour at the top of the back was purple in the male and brown or flesh coloured in the female, though in all young birds the colour of both sexes may be brown.

CHINESE NIGHTINGALES.

Can any reader who may have kept these beautiful birds in an aviary tell "Bird Lover" (Surrey Hills) something of their manner of nesting? One of her pair has a habit of sitting down upon any bunch of green stuff thrown into the aviary.

SMALL GARDEN SNAIL.

The small snail sent for identification from the Central school, North Fitzroy, can accommodate itself to life either on land or in the water. It is called Melanie; in form a spiral, long in proportion to its width, though never much longer than one-third of an inch. A little colony of them may exist in a moist corner of the garden for many years, but never spread, so while they sometimes damage plants they are never a pest.

A TREASURE HUNT,

You have all heard through history or Captain Donald Maclean how our forefathers used to go buccaneering to the Indies in the brave days of old. Whenever they were hard up" or stony broken-in the argot of those degenerate days hath it-they used to declare war against anybodywho had saved up great store of gold plate, silver ingots, Caribbean pearls, or Spanish gold doub-loose, and go after the treasure. History is re-peating itself-the reverse way. A band of West indian advertiser's- pleasantly disguised as a cricket team is coming here this summer, and the Buccaneers, will catch you, too, if you don't

watch out.

You have heard about flic pirates,

And the Imtjrimecis of old. Who

went returning to the Indies

Alter plate and Spanish gold ; But the Indies now adventure

Upon quite another lack,

And they're waiting for Australia

Just to get the bullion back,

They are after Bradman's thousands

And the records that he got.

We had IwHer watch the Ashes,

Or they'll maybe grab the lot.

Come the Great and Small Antilles,

With the crossbones at the bore. On the give and take adventure.

That our fathers worked of yore.

With history thus repeated,

We'll lie needing once again Of some Murrumbidgee Morgan,

With a band of desperate men. And that low and rakish schooner

Such as pirates always had, To go cruising after ashes

VA here they're kept-at Trinidad.

IN -THE OPEN AIR.

ZEBRA. FINCHES.

I "ilirdlover" (Surrey Hills), who is much ina interested in nature study", is able to verify the

suggestion that zebra finches (chestnut-cared) keep on nearing through the winter, although her experience is limited to nest-building. She bought some last spring, and in the aviary they at once began meeting. When there were as many young hatched and reared as she wished to keep she pulled down the pests, believing that it would stop further meeting, as it was about the end of the season. As they continued building she gave away all the hen birds, but the males kept on restoring the nests however frequently they- were pulled down.

Without being at all positive about it, I got the idea at Lancaster that on very frosty nights these tender little rebras clustered in numbers for shelter and warmth into some of their old, nests in the orange trees.

CITY SWANS.

The swans of the Botanic Gardens are often mentioned in these notes. At the pond in the University grounds a swan is also sitting on a clutch of six eggs.

LARGE SCORPION.

As compared with those of other countriesSouth Africa, for example-the scorpions of Australia are very small, and one sent by Natural-ist from Coleraine a few days ago was by a good deal the largest I have seen at least twice the size of the scorpion commonly found under bark or a stone. The sling is venomous and very painful.

NOT UNDERSTOOD.

"Birdiovcr" (Armadale) was so pleased at finding a blackbird again nesting in a shrub in her garden where the nest had been ravaged by a vagrant cat last year that she tried to arrange some wire netting about the branch for its protection. Apparently her motives were misunderstood, because only" one egg was, laid in the nest. That has since disappeared, and the next seems to

be deserted.

When birds abandon a nest they never in any circumstances remove eggs which it may contain

to a new nest.

LORIKEETS AND NECTAR.

Just how the lorikeets discover a flowering eucalypt in places which parcels do not usually frequent has often puzzled me. Long ago I noticed that if some eucalypt for choice one of those very rich in nectar bloomed in the heart of the city the musk lorikeets soon occupied it, though, absorbed in their banquet among the boughs, they are never heard and not often seen. Their silence then is in curious contrast to their shrieking flight note as they stream like arrows through the bush. The beauty and belle of the family is the lustrous Rainbow, which we once knew as

the blue mountain.

ACHERON VALLEY FISHING.

I have not had much experience of fishing the streams on the Acheron Valley between Narbethong

and Marysville, but enough to be aware that about I the end of September two anglers of Elwood man in ordinary conditions get good sport there. The, trout are gullies, but not very large, and fishing near Marysville. on,- has a choice of the Taggerty, Meyerson, and .Vc-'itiuii down towards. Buxton, i Hie Little River at 'Taggerty is, ! have heard,

a good spot 5hr spring fishing, and in behind a

Maryvale- the Big River el.lon ft-!u*I-has some, fine rainbows. It- throwback to pilling Acheron stream U dial you are so often shut out from, good trout water by desire walls of blackberry.