This species is very abundant in all parts of South Australia, where it
inhabits the large _Eucalypti_. During my stay in Adelaide I frequently
saw it on some of the high trees that had been allowed to remain by the
sides of the streets in the middle of the city. From this locality it
extends its range eastward to New South Wales, where it is much more
rare, and where it can only be sought for with the certainty of finding
it along the extreme limits of the colony towards the interior. I killed
several specimens in the Upper Hunter district, and observed it to be
tolerably numerous on the plains in the neighbourhood of the river
Namoi, and that it breeds in all these countries is proved by my having
killed the young in different stages of growth in all of them. In its
habits and economy it differs considerably from the _Melithreptus
validirostris_; for instance, I never saw it perch on the boles of the
trees, as is usual with that species, neither is it so exclusively
confined to the large trees. It is a very noisy bird, constantly
uttering a loud harsh grating call while perched on the topmost dead or
bare branch of a high tree; the call being as frequently uttered by the
female as by the male. Like the _Melithreptus lunulatus_, it frequents
the leafy branches, which it threads and creeps among with the greatest
ease and dexterity, assuming in its progress a variety of graceful
attitudes. Insects and the pollen of flowers being almost its sole food,
those trees abounding with blossoms are visited by it in preference to
others.
There is no variation in the colouring of the sexes, but there is a very
considerable difference between the young and old birds, particularly in
the colouring of the soft parts; the young are much less brilliant than
the young of _M. validirostris_, in which the colouring of the soft
parts far excels those of the adults.
With the nest and eggs of this species I am unacquainted; they are
therefore desiderata to my cabinet, and would be thankfully received
from any person resident in the colony where the bird is so common. That
the nest will be cup-shaped in form, constructed of grasses, &c., and
suspended by the rim to the smaller branches of the _Eucalypti_, and
that the eggs will be two or three in number, there can be little doubt.
Crown of the head black, an occipital band of white terminating at each
eye; ear-coverts and back of the neck black; back and rump golden olive;
wings and tail brown; throat greyish white, with a central stripe of
black; under surface greyish brown; bill black; feet and tarsi brownish
orange; irides hazel; bare skin above the eye beautiful bluish green.
The young have the gape, lower mandible, and feet yellowish orange.
The Plate represents the two sexes of the natural size.
[Illustration:
MELITHREPTUS LUNULATUS.
_J. Gould and H. C. Richter del et lith._ _Hullmandel & Walton Imp._
]
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