Van Diemen’s Land and Western Australia are the only colonies in which
this bird has not been observed; its range, therefore, over the
continent may be considered as very general: in South Australia and New
South Wales it would appear to be migratory, visiting those parts in
summer for the purpose of breeding. Among other places where I observed
it in considerable abundance was Mosquito, and the other small islands
near the mouth of the Hunter, and on the borders of the rivers Mokai and
Namoi, situated to the northward of Liverpool Plains; in these
last-mentioned localities it was breeding among the large flooded
gum-trees bordering the rivers.
The breeding-season commences in September and continues until January,
during which period at least two broods are reared. In the Christmas
week of 1839, at which time I was on the plains of the interior, in the
direction of the Namoi, the young progeny of the second brood were
perched in pairs or threes together, on a dead twig near their nest, as
represented in the Plate. They were constantly visited and fed by the
adults, who were hawking about for insects in great numbers, some
performing their evolutions above the tops and among the branches of the
trees, while others were sweeping over the open plain with great
rapidity of flight, making in their progress through the air the most
rapid and abrupt turns; at one moment rising to a considerable altitude
and the next descending to within a few feet of the ground, as the
insects of which they were in pursuit arrested their attention. In the
brushes, on the contrary, the flight of this bird is more soaring and of
a much shorter duration, particularly when hawking in the open glades,
which frequently teem with insect life. When flying near the ground the
white mark on the rump shows very conspicuously, and strikingly reminds
one of the House Marten of our own country.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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