Journals of Expeditions of Discovery into Central Australia and Overland from Adelaide to King George's Sound in the Years 1840-1: Sent By the Colonists of South Australia, with the Sanction and Support of the Government: Including an Account of the Manners and Customs of the Aborigines and the State of Their Relations with Europeans — Volume 01Eyre, Edward John
History
Journals of Expeditions of Discovery into Central Australia and Overland from Adelaide to King George's Sound in the Years 1840-1: Sent By the Colonists of South Australia, with the Sanction and Support of the Government: Including an Account of the Manners and Customs of the Aborigines and the State of Their Relations with Europeans — Volume 01
Eyre, Edward John
Australia -- Discovery and exploration; Ethnology -- Australia
Mr. Eyre in his notes states--"The Fresh water cray-fish, of the smaller
variety; native names, cu-kod-ko, or koon-go-la, is found in the alluvial
flats of the river Murray, in South Australia, which are subject
to a periodical flooding by the river; it burrows deep below the
surface of the ground as the floods recede and are dried up, and
remains dormant, until the next flooding recals it to the surface;
at first it is in a thin and weakly state, but soon recovers and gets
plump and fat, at which time it is most excellent eating. Thousands
are procured from a small space of ground with ease, and hundreds
of natives are supported in abundance and luxury by them for many
weeks together. It sometimes happens that the flood does not recur
every year, and in this case the eu-kod-ko lie dormant until the next,
and a year and a half would thus be passed below the surface. I have
often seen them dug out of my garden, or in my wheat field, by the men
engaged in digging ditches for irrigation. The floods usually overflow
the river flats in August or September, and recede again in February or
March. For further particulars respecting the modes of catching the
eu-kod-kos, vide vol. ii. pages 252 and 267."
"I have spoken of this cray-fish as the SMALLER variety as respects the
Murray. It is LARGER than the one found in the ponds of the river Torrens
at Adelaide; but in the river Murray one is procured of a size ranging to
4 1/2 lbs., and which is QUITE EQUAL in flavour to the FINEST lobster."
These latter have not yet been received in any of our collections, so
that we are unable to state how it differs from those now described: they
must be the giants of the genus.
1. The Van Diemen's Land Cray-fish. ASTACUS FRANKLINII, t. 3. f.
1.--Carapace convex on the sides, rather rugose on the sides behind, the
front only slightly produced and edged with a toothed raised margin not
reaching beyond the front edge of the lower orbit, and with a very short
ridge at the middle of each orbit behind; the hands compressed, rather
rugose, edge thick and toothed: wrist with four or five conical spines on
the inner side, the front the largest: the central caudal lobe, broad,
continuous, calcareous to the tip, lateral lobes, with a very slight
central keel; the sides of the second abdominal rings spinose.
Inhab. Van Diemen's Land.
Mr. Milne Edwards, (Archives du Museum, ii. 35. t. 3.) has recently
described a species of this genus from Madagascar, under the name of A.
MADAGASCARIENSIS, which is nearly allied to the Van Diemen's Land
species, in the shortness of the frontal process, the spines on the sides
of the second abdominal segment, and in the lobes of the tail; but it
differs from it in the length of the claws, and other particulars.
Madagascar appears to be the tropical confines of the genus.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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