This bird inhabits reed-beds and thickets, particularly such as are
overgrown with creepers and rank vegetation; I believe it to be found
throughout New South Wales in all places suitable to its habits,
although, from the recluse nature of its disposition, it is a species
familiar to few, even of those who have been long resident in the
colony. I killed it at Illawarra, and other specimens were presented to
me by Mr. Stephen Coxen, which had been shot by him in New England, an
extensive district to the eastward of the Liverpool Plains. Its powers
of flight are very limited, but it threads the thickets and runs over
the ground with the greatest facility. It resembles the true _Maluri_
carrying the tail erect, as also in many other of its actions. I had no
opportunity of ascertaining whether or not it be migratory; but my own
impression is that it is stationary, since its powers of flight are
inadequate to enable it to pass over much extent of country, and the
thick brushes near the coast afford it ample shelter in winter.
I did not succeed in finding its nest, but in its nidification it
doubtless closely assimilates to the Long-billed Bristle-bird of the
western coast.
The sexes present no difference in plumage and but little in size; the
female is, however, rather the least.
The food consists of insects of various orders.
All the upper surface brown; wings, tail-coverts and tail rufous brown,
the latter indistinctly barred with a darker tint; under surface grey,
gradually passing into the brown of the upper surface; over the eye an
indistinct buffy stripe; irides brown; bill brown, becoming much lighter
on the lower mandible; legs greyish brown.
The Plate represents a male of the natural size.
[Illustration:
DASYORNIS TENUIROSTRIS: _Gould_.
_J. & E. Gould del^t._ _C. Hullmandel Imp._
]
DASYORNIS LONGIROSTRIS, _Gould_.
Long-billed Bristle-bird.
_Dasyornis longirostris_, Gould in Proc. of Zool. Soc., Part VIII. p.
170.
_Djyr-dal-ya_, Aborigines of the lowland districts of Western
Australia.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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