The Diprotodons of Lake Callabonna
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AUSTRALIAN NATURAL HISTORY Published Quarterly by the Australian Museum, College Street, Sydney lntemational Standard Serial Number: 0004-9840 Editor: F. H. TALBOT, Ph.D., F.L.S. Annual subscription, $2.50 posted Assistant Editor: P. F. COLLIS Single copy, 50c (62c posted) To become a11 annual subscriber to "Australian Natural History" send cheque or money order (made payable to the Government Printing Office) to the Government Printer, Box 4050. G.P.O., Sydney, N.S. W. 2001. Single copies are obtainable by post similarly. VOL. 17, NO. II SEPTEMBER 15, 1973 CONTENTS PAGE TH F. 0IPROTODONS OF LAKE CALLABONNA- Ric/Iard H. Tee/ford 349 THE RATIONAL UsE OF NATURAL RESOURCES-StephenS. Clark 355 RATS AS ANIMALS-S. A. Bamett 360 NATURALIST's UNIQU E OSPR EY PHOTO- Vincent Serventy 364 ABORIGI NA L WATERHOLES IN THE COBAR AREA- C. M . Cunningham 365 3,000 YEARS OF TRADE IN NEW GUINEA 0BSIDIAN- Wal/ace Ambrose 370 SOUND PRODUCTIO N IN ClCA DAS- Dm1id Young 375 NEW BOOKS REVIEWED 374 MEET OUR CONTRIBUTORS 380 • FRONT COVER: Antechinus stuartii, commonly called Marsupial Mouse, is the subject of an intensive research programme by the Department of Environmental Studies at the Australian Museum. Amechinus stuartii, common in forest habitats throughout southeastern Australia, is especially interesting because each year all the males die within a period of two weeks, leaving behind a population consisting solely of pregnant females. Antechinus stuartii is a marsupial, and its only resemblance to a mouse is its small size, from 20 to 40 grams (about five-sevenths of an ounce to about 1-} ounces). It is an cater of insects and other small animals. The Museum's research aims to provide basic ecological information on Anteclrinus stuartii and other small animals so that better ways of ma naging forests, to ensure the animals' survival, can be recommended. [Photo: Howard Hughes.] BACK COVE R: The Wanderer Butterfly (Danaus plexippus) suddenly extended its range across the Pacific Ocean from North America in the second half of the nineteenth century. It colonized island after island, reaching Australia about 1870. The prior introduction of suitable plants for its larva enabled it to become established in Australia. [Photo: C. V. Turner.] The Diprotodons of Lake Callahonna By RICHARD H. TEDFORD Curator of Vertebrate Palaeontology, American Museum of Natural History, New York HE heroic exploits of the nineteenth century explorers of Australia are Tknown to every Australian schoolchild in terms of new land discovered and its potential for settlement. Little attention has been paid to the very large contribution these early explorers made to natural history. Because of their discoveries, however, it was possible, by the 1840's, for John Gould to present to the world, through his magnificent hand-coloured folios, a glimpse of the brilliant and fascinating birds and mammals of the still new colony, and for Sir Richard Owen to announce the discovery of the remains of an equally fascinating extinct fauna of giant marsupials, reptiles, and birds that had inhabited Australia's past. Owen, of the British M useum of Natural History, was at once the author of the term "dinosaur", the world's leading comparative anatomist, and the major scientific antagonist of Darwin's concept of evolution. For nearly 40 years he alone took on the task of describing the fossil bones from Australia's cave and river deposits. With consummate skill he interpreted the nature of extinct animals that were as strange to the eyes of comparative anatomists as their living counterparts were to the eyes of the first settlers in Australia. One of several Diprotodou trackways preserved in hardened, limy mud and etched out on the Diprotodon jaw present lake-surface by the wind. The prints were made in deep mud and do not retain many One of the first collections of Australian details of the foot of Diprotodon, but impressions fossil mammal remains was made in I 830 of the claws may be seen. The prints are by Sir Thomas Mitchell, Surveyor-General advancing towards the author, whose hand is (and later Governor) of the colony of New shown for scale. [Photo: John Mitchell.] South Wales. This collection came from the limestone fissures of the Wellington What emerged was a rhinoceros-sized district, New South Wales. Among the quadruped, standing about 5 -~ fee t at the remains, which were made available to Owen, shoulder, with a massive head. The two was a fragment of a lower jaw bearing two tusks of the lower jaw were opposed by two large, rootless, chisel-like lower incisors. large chisel-like upper incisors, fl anked on Owen concluded that this was the jaw of a each side by a pair of smaller incisors. The giant marsupial, which he named Diprotodon cheek teeth were double-ridged grinders that ("two front teeth"). would have been effective in shredding By 1877 Owen had received enough vegetation to a suitable form fo r digestion. material from Australia, especially from the This strange beast was made even more early settlers of the Darling Downs, south mysterious by the fai lure of the great eastern Queensland, to enable him to comparative anatomist to settle on the reconstruct the skeleton of Diprotodon. identification of the boot-bones. Because Australian Natur·al History Page 349 Above: The Diprotodon skeleton in the American Museum of Natural History, New York. It was mounted from casts, prepared by the South Australian Museum, of a composite skeleton obtained by the 1893 expedition to Lake Callabonna, South Australia. Below: Reconstruction of Diprotodon, by Walter Ferguson, from the skeleton shown above. [Photos by courtesy of the American Museum of Natural History.] I ~ Page 350 September, 1973 Owen was baffled by the feet he illustrated The Hurst party discovered, and 60 years the reconstructed skeleton standing in grass later we were able to confirm, that many of tall enough to hide them from view! The the Diprotodon skeletons bore a crust of problem of the feet of Diprotodon had to lime-cemented clay around portions of the wait another 15 years before it was to be body, especially the feet, which remarkably solved in a spectacular way at Lake preserved impressions of the hide, hair, and Callabonna in South Australia. foot pads of these animals. Similar li me crust around the bodies of the giant emu-like Search for complete skeleton birds and extinct kangaroos also found at By the late nineteenth century Owen's Lake Callabonna have provided an unusual reports had raised considerable interest in opportunity to study the feathers and hides Australian scientific circles, and the quest of long-dead animals. for a complete skeleton of Diprotodon was actively pursued. The breakthrough came Exciting discoveries at Lake Callabonna, then called Lake Perhaps one of the most exciting discoveries Mulligan, one of the chain of normally dry made by the Hurst party can best be told in saltpans that stretch from Lake Frome the words of its discoverer, George H urst, northward along the foot of the northeastern writing to his brother Henry in early J uly Flinders Ranges. An Aboriginal stockman while the latter was in Adelaide reporting to on the Ragless brothers' Callabonna Station, the Museum Committee: "As soon as I had a large sheep property just east of the lake, dug under the pelvis and into the exact spot reported numerous large bones in the lake where the pouch would be I came on a dear bed. Examination of these bones by Mr little diprotodon humerus about si x inches F. B. Ragless so aroused his interest that he long. It is evident the large ani mal is a notified the South Australian Museum female and had a picanniny diprotodon in authorities. They in turn employed Mr her pouch when she died . The claim is Henry Hurst to examine the site and report very wet and the bones are very diffi cult to to the Museum Committee. Mr Hurst, a remove but you can depend I will get them all Queensland geologist with experience in as I think this is the most wonderfu l discovery searching for fossil vertebrates, reported that ever made in the world." the bones were even more numerous than The Museum Committee and the Director, had been thought, and the Museum Sir Edward C. Stirling, were impressed, as Committee enthusiastically agreed to support was Sir Thomas Elder, whose gift of £50 a three-months collecting expedition to the made possible several more months of lake ; £250 was squeezed from a slender excavating. Stirling and his Assistant budget for this purpose. Director, A. H. C. Zietz, visited the site in The expedition, which went into the fie ld A ugust and decided to assume di rect control in March, 1893 , was led by Mr H urst and over the excavations, with Zietz in charge. included his brother George, two excavators Collecting continued until N ovember when (Templeton and Meldrum), and a cook heat, dust, and fli es made fu rther work (Mayo). Before heavy rain in June made impossible. Stirling's narrative of the 1893 further work temporarily impossible, Mr expedition contains a graphic account of the H urst's party had counted 360 individual work and gives insight into the conditions Diprotodon skeletons on the surface in a that caused the failure of many sheep and limited area of a few acres and had removed cattle properties in the inland around the parts of seventy to eighty of them. In most turn of the century. the feet were preserved, having been pushed In the years that followed, Stirling and Zietz deepest into the ancient la ke bed as the described the 1893 collecti on, in particular animals struggled to free themselves from the the fee t of Diprotodon, the skeleton of the sticky clays.