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as a spider. But not any more. By spending time in their com­ pany I have managed to over­ hy do so come my fear. . d ? I ' many people fear spt ers. can t I hope that all those people re member ever having a conversa­ who have been coming to the tion with someone who said they Australian Museum's great spi­ like them and I often end up talking der exhibition have also start­ to people about spiders when they ed to see spiders in a new light find out I work at the Australian and will not be so quick with Museum. the heel of their boots or the Jn fact, my office is right next insect spray next time they door to the spider department and meet one. eve1y now and then I find it relaxing So, if you want to get to know to take a break from my work and spiders better, turn to page 40 wonder in there to see what their and take a peak at their some­ res ident arachnids are up to. I've times extreme mating behav­ been lucky enough to see the iour. Funnel-webs having their mites But don't worry, if you can't removed, the tarantula shedding its manage to bring yourself to skin and a big, beautiful golden orb­ feel feel warm and friendly weaver spinning her egg sac. And towards a spider just yet, this � 3: lets not forget dinner time-the issue contains plenty of alter- � most exciting time of all. natives. Try one of the cutest � Spiders really are fascinating creatures and when you stop little mammals in Australia-the Feathertail Glider, or how being afraid of them and take the time to learn a bit about about a very interesting group of Western Australian frogs, or them, then their behaviour is not as unpredictable and fright­ Australia's native miner birds. Then there's seahorses, ening. I say this from experience because for many years I pigeons, butterflies, bilbies and grasshoppers. It's a great suffered from arachnaphobia. I couldn't be in the same room issue-enjoy. -Jennifer Saunders

Please send me a complimentary copy of your brochure. Shanng Freycinet 1s an expenence you'll You will need more than JUst one night to immerse yourself 1n Name ______ne the beauty ofTasmania's most stunning coastal wilderness area. . ver forgetS�uated inside Freycinet Natio naJ Park. Address ______Just a walk ;may fromf amous More cime to share our range of highly acclaimed natural Winegla ss Bay. reF yonet Lodge activr!Jes.More cime to share the Lodge's quiet comforts 1s a relaxng, ______Ph _____ rnult,.award agent knows w1nn1ng haven �in an area . at the end of a fulfilling day. Your travel of 5Pectacular F reyc In e t Lodg e . us today. Send this coupon to: Freycinei Lodge natural scene� all about Freyonet Lodge. Ask about fluvc1N[1 NATIONAL f>ARK •coLLs a"" PO Box 225 Kings Meadows 7249 TASMANIA. A Phone (03) 6257 0/01 Fox (03) 6257 0278 ''r'-, 4349 WORL D OF NATU RAL ACTIVITIE S

NAT URE AUST RALIA AUTUMN 1998 Articles

Na'lUfe98 VOLUME 25 NUMBER 12 AUTUMN 19

Published by The Australian Museum Trust 6 College Street, Sydney, NSW 2000. Phone: (02) 9320 6000 Fax: (02) 9320 6073 Internet:[email protected] Web: http:/ /www.austrnus.gov.au Trust President: Malcolm Long Museum Director: Desmond Griffin WHAT MAKES TICKING FROGS TICK? MANAGING EDITOR Ticking Frogs live in a swampy Jennifer Saunders, B.Sc. pocket of south-western SCIENTIFIC EDITOR Australia and their survival Georgina Hickey, B.Sc. FEATHERTAIL GLIDERS depends on our understanding PHOTO & EDITORIAL RESEARCHER They're tree leapers, sap tickers of the dynamic evolutionary Kate Lowe and hollow log sleepers, and processes that are going on in they're very, very cute. that remote area. DESIGN AND PRODUCTION BY SIMON WARD BY DON DRISCOLL Watch This! Design 24 48 PR! TING Excel Printing ADVERTISI G AND MARKETING Phone: (02) 9320 6178 SUBSCRIPTIONS Phone: (02) 9320 6119 Toll-free (1800) 028 558 Fax: (02) 9320 6073

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New subscriptions can be made by credit card on the NATUREAUSTRALIA toll-freehotline (1800) 028 558 or A MINER CHALLENGE use tl1e form in tl1is magazine. lf it has been removed, Whenis a Black-eared Miner send cheque, money order or credit card authorisation not a Black-eared Miner? to the address above, made payable to the 'Australian When it starts turning into a Museum' in Australian currency. Yellow-throated Miner! All material appearingin NATURE AUSTRALIA is copyright. Reproduction in part or whole is not permitted BY LES CHRJSTIDIS without written authorisationfrom the Editor. & TESS HOLDERNESS NATURE AUSTRALIA welcomes articles on the natural and cultural heritage of tl1e Australian Region. Opinions 32 expressed by the autl10rs are their own and do not necessarily represent the policies or views of the Australian Museum. NATURE AUSTRALIA is printed on archival quality paper suitable for library collections. Published 1998 ISSN-1324-2598

_ . NATURE AUSTRALIA (as ANH) is proud winner of the 1987 '88 '89 ® '90 , '91, '92 & '93 Whitley Awa,:ds f�r Best Periodical, and the 1988 & '90 Australian Heritage Awards. Front Cover MAYBE SIZE DOES A Feathertail Glider COUNT at a banksia Female orb-weaving spiders SEAHORSES UNDER inflorescence. The will oftentry to eat rather than SIEGE greet their suitors. Can this Whether seahorses have two rows of stiff hairs magical powers or not, in some projecting sideways extraordinary behaviour countries they're going to need from the tail give it explainthe sometimes huge a miracle to survive. Could a feather-like difference in size between the aquaculture be that miracle? appearance. sexes? Photo by Wesley BY MARK A. ELGAR BY AMANDA VINCENT Tolhurst. 40 56 2 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 res NATURE STRIPS Regular Featu Cannibalism Before Sex; RALIST Beaked Whales Suck; Hot ACKYARD NATU THE B Lotus; WhoSaid Earless Frogs LTURE'S VULTURES Can't Hear?; Wingless CU them, race eons: you can eat Scorpion-fly; GenitalEyes; New Pig feed them, em, breed the�n or Zealand Rats; Lemming th d of them! bttlju st try getting ri Latrines; Silk Gift Wrapping; YCK BY STEVE VAN D Blue Balls; Newtritios Eggs?; Blue Blood; Sand-swimming 18 Moles; Quick Quiz. 6

P H O T O A R T THE LAST WORD FLUTTER-BYS TRIUMPH OF THE Various Nature Focus EASTER BILBY photographers present a moth The chocolate Rabbit is out and among butterflies. the Easter bilby is in ... yum! BY NATURE FOCUS BY TIM FLANNERY PHOTO LIBRARY 80 64 REVIEWS A Fossicker's Guide to Columns Gemstones in Australia; Snakes in Question; The Graham RARE & ENDANGERED LETTERS Pizzey & Frank Knight Field Eyewitness Accounts; The Guide to the Birds of Australia; LEICHHARDT'S Sightless Tiger; WhyDo Native Australian Flora; Listen... Our GRASSHOPPER Stingless Bees Fight?; Wombats, Land is Crying; Australian Inappropriate fire regimes Genetics and Politics; Bird Sounds Audio Tapes; mean that Kakadu's Pandanus Dieback Explained. Frogs and Reptiles of the spectacular grasshoppers are Sydney Region. struggling to stay one jump 4 ahead of extinction. 72 BY PENELOPE SOCIETY PAGE GREENSIADE & LYN LOWE Interested in nature but not 20 sure what to do or where to go ? ature Australia's Society Page is a great place to start. 75 THE GUIDE Nature Australia's market place. 76

Q&A Cocoon of Danger; Mixed Signals; Big Happy Cats; Pie Teaser. 78

WIL D T HIGSN VIEWSFROM THEFOUR DIMENSIONTH MADE IN AUSTRALIA FRIED AND FOOTLESS ,i Far Ironi bezng b an evolutionary FOSSIL FANGERS ack water, Australia could II be Snakes: big ones, little ones, ie orig·zn 01,r many a d of the plant fat ones, skinny ones. n an zmal species around world the Australia's had a taste of -including hat"c1 world · the them all, and they've had a 's bir d species taste of us! BYTJM LOW 22 BY MICHAEL ARCHER 70 3 NATUREA USTALR AUTUIA MN 1998 It:::, - as hard as you push the DELETE key the word 'but' LETTERS will remain in discussions of the Thylacine; I think for The forum for readers to much longer than Michael air their views about their Archer can hold his breath. concerns, past articles and -Tony Dwyer Tasmania interesting personal events. The Sightless Tiger I've never seen a Thylacine That Tacit Tassie 'Devil' ' And folk who might rep�rt Eyewitness a report of a Thylacine would search in 1983 after one of a sight their most expe1ienced wildlife Accounts not be believed because they Aren't strictly on the level. r officers reported a clear In Michael Acher's are presumed not to be there. Their appetite for sheep r sighting at close quarters in scoldings of those who dare I also wonder if Acher applied at night think the Thylacine might his scepticism to pre-1936 an area with a history of reports. Since then any Brought them into bad odour exist (Nature Aust. Autumn eyewitness reports of Thyla­ Then bounty-hunt spelt ' 1997) I fear the value of cines. They could be just as budget has been in the low hundreds of dollars per year, exeunt, eyewitness accounts was unreliable as present-day Thus to promote their coda. confused with the likelihood ones. In reality, scepticism barely enough to document of the animal being extinct. seems as subjective as any reports. It seems the auth­ orities are "damned if they There are some chaps with Eyewitness accounts alone other approach to problems. handicaps are undoubtedly unreliable Although over half the do and damned if they don't". recent reports indeed come I agree that the Thylacine Who spot a flying object, Gust con ider the variation in Then write memoirs of men reporting of the same bank from areas marked on large­ is probably extinct, but can robbery) but not all report­ scale maps as wet forest, in Michael Archer honestly say from Mars, ers are wrong. Indeed, most detail most of these places there is no chance for them Or some similar project. science is based on eye­ were drier habitat. So what, at least in Tasmania? I deal witness records of some sort anyway? Thylacines were with a wide variety of land­ Beware of hoax or tasteless and it is a bit rich of Archer historically encountered in owners and can assure him jokes, to suggest that, because he most Tasmanian habitats and that science has a very Some painted striped and Dick Smith have made many were caught in wet tenuous grip on many rural deceivers mistakes in identification, forest, the habitat Archer Australians; just as much a Will vandalise and scandalise everyone else must do so all dismisses as unsuitable. case of city arrogance as Your precious true believers. the time. I don't know where all the country ignorance. Declar­ Not much in Archer's style spending is that Archer ations by academics of what Therefore abstain, you'll supports his claim to be scoffs at. In the past decades people must believe despite search in vain, open-minded. I bet if he by far the most effort has their own experience don't They are no more in situ. received an eyewitness re­ been by private searchers help. I bet searching for Thy­ To be succinct, they are port of a wombat in Tas­ using their own resources lacines could be just as much extinct, m_ania he would accept it that would in reality not be fun as digging up fossils and Won't be around to bite you. without question. You see, otherwise available. Sure, in any case, how does on� -Len Green the presumption would be the Tasmanian Parks and get proof without looking? Rose Bay, NSW that they are there, whereas Wildlife Service carried out a So dear sceptics, it seems Why Do Native ., fj'! Stingless Bees rfr,tl �. . : "} Fight? l�t'lr. :.:r,J,.:,, ,, ,., ! ' ( One of the biggest �- V.J ,, ) I ;17•!: • .!_,, ,, :.:,�',Ji,,-' mysteries of the native sting­ rJi , I'1 • ,-�rl,. 'ltt• , ;; fl('' /L ;•,. •;!f,ii.t:., less bees of Australia is the .,;fi�.,1t1 1·•11:U.tj1-. fascinating fighting swarm. f;J· 11.?,/,tfff�t,,.,Rrt,r;·r (� Like Henry Drew (Nature ifrt',!7i V'Jr Aust. Winter 1997) we have ii i;,;.;10Ji, ' /j/l1JJ11,l�m;r •' seen hundreds of Trigona workers emerge from a nest tN}1rs and begin attacking one \,.·. ,I f it!}'r.. another. They fall to the ·. ::�}l,• l[/· .-;, i.'· ground locked in twos or ,.�;fff. ·-•!, •I1.-t '' ,, •.1·J!,·,(,/.':). ·.,•, ..,r1 , � f '1 ,1",""! Im f. _ l.f."5'' • I'•', threes and wrestle each I·'/t' '· ,• .�,.'f.,.,_., r.,::·,. ! •ll ., t' ll �J-t· . ',' c'rc/•11,• '. ; other to the death. V'l ,�J ' ,I 'r1••,_'�,, ',' a .. ..., t,, · J "'·

Is sexual cannibalism in fishing spiders a consequence of youthful exuberance? 6 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 -

nktonic prey, while pla (odonto­ toothed whales cetes) generally grasp their food with their teeth. But sci­ entists have long been puz­ zled about how beaked whales-a group of virtually toothless 'toothed whales' with narrow snouts and small mouths-are able to catch an d hold onto their prey. These whales (family Ziphiidae) have only one or two pairs of teeth, and often only in mature males, and are thought to be used mainly in aggressive encounters. Investigating a long-held theory that beaked whales use suction to capture their prey-something common in fish, butpreviously unproved in whales-John Heyning (Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County) and James Mead (National Mus­ eum . of Natural History, Washmgton DC) dissected numerous museum speci­ mens. They found all ziphiids have a pair of grooves in the gular region, the part of the throat lying between the jaw bones, and suggest that like a similar structure in b�leen whales, these allow for expansion of the throat region. In addition, large muscles attached to the ton�ue enable it to move r�p,dly back in the mouth in a piston-like motion. The researchers believe that the C?mbination of throat expan­ swn and tongue retraction :V0uld lead to a sudden drop 111 pr�ssure in the oral cavity, creati�g enough suction to dra':V 111 slippery prey like squid and fish. They tested the theory on rescued :::,V, Hubb's Beaked u ales (Mesoplodon carl­ S: rubbsz) "',.., recovering in aquari­ ::, ums · oneWhe n researcher z � Placed a finger in the whale's z mou C> th' ,t suckled strongly, j and a.: :,vhen presented with a "' fis h ' ,t was literally vacuumed __..__...J >--' up. ,, Sacred Lotus flowers heat up Th fimdm · gs have Hot Lotus covered that the Sacred i other and stay hot. mpli�a r ns too, say Heyning egend has it that Buddha Lotus has a remarkable abili­ and M ead ty to significantly raise and . Previously Lwas born in the flower of Although it sounds like a und amag d the tempera­ e squid found in a Sacred Lotus (Nelumbo tightly maintain f��t _more akin with the capa­ the stomachs nucifera). ture of its flowers. w of beaked What truth there is b1hbes of a mammal, heat pro­ h l 5 (and also By inserting super thin wh!1 sperm in that, of course, is anyone's d�ction in plants is quite a !s ) were taken as evi- how­ metallic heat sensors into the , dence guess. As it turns out, widespread phenomenon in t the whales used_ of the Sacred plant's flowers, the research­ d echolo��� ever, the flower the aroid family an has also , ion. to stun their Lotus would be quite a cosy ers found that the plant could l prey but suction been reported from a few feeding may place for a mythological new­ hold the temperatures within species of waterlilies, palms, Prov'id e an alternative ° to expla- born. a range of 30-35 C for up d d nati on as to cyca s and custar apples w wh Y t h e squid Adelaide University zoolo­ four days, even when the sur­ (see Nature Aust.* Summer ere unmar d ke . gists Roger Seymour and rounding temperature drop­ ° * Previously ANH -R.S. Paul Schultze-Motel have dis- ped to as low as 10 C. NATURE A USTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 7 1994-95 and Spring 1991). No several frog species are 'ear­ then settled back and How do 'earless' frogs, such as other plant, however, has less', lacking an externaltym­ watched how the male frogs this Panamanian Golden Frog, been known to demonstrate panum, middle ear cavity and responded to the recording. manage to communicate with one such a precise ability to regu­ auditory ossicle. Paradoxi­ What they saw convinced another? late temperature as the cally, these frogs often still them that the frogs could Sacred Lotus. vocalise, despite their appar­ indeed hear the tape. Of the localising the sound source. The mechanism by which ent auditory impairment. 15 frogs they tested, seven And their foot signalling Sacred Lotus flowers regulate The Panamanian Golden vocalised, ten turned towards showed that male Panaman­ temperature remains a mys­ Frog (Atelopus zetehi), found the speaker and 11 signalled ian Golden Frogs aren't con­ tery but the researchers only in the lowlands of west- with their feet. During foot tent to let their call do the speculate upon a reason for talking, beefing up their the phenomenon. Theybelieve male-male aggressive reper­ the heat acts as an energetic toire with an added visual dis­ reward for the beetles that Panamanian Golden Frogs aren't content play. Similar behaviour has pollinate the flowers. Many been observed in a number of insects must produce their to let their call do the talking, beefing up frog species (see Nature own heat by shivering, before Aust.* Spring 1993), most they can fly or compete for their aggressive repertoire with an commonly those inhabiting food and mates. By providing noisy mountain streams the insects with he.at, the added visual display. where a calling frog some­ plant may enhance digestion, times just can't make himself growth or reproduction of its heard. pollinators and may prepare ern-central Panama, is one signalling, the males waved The mechanism by which them for their flight to other such species. Erik Lindquist one of their front feet in a cir­ 'earless' frogs manage to hear lotus flowers. and Thomas Hetherington of cular motion and occasionally is still a mystery, although -K.McG. Ohio State University studied stomped one of their hind the researchers believe it these endangered frogs, to limbs. is through a lung­ Who Said determine whether or not These responses gave the inner ear pathway. Work cur­ Earless Frogs they can hear and what role researchers some interesting rently under way on earless Can't Hear? their vocalisations play in insights into the frogs' social fire-bellied toads (genus communications. behaviour. By orienting to­ Bombina) indicates that the or those of us kept awake The cientists searched for wards the speaker, the frogs lung is acting as a type of Fat night by the incessant male frogs along rocky demonstrated that not only pressure transducer, like an croaking of a pond-full of streams, placing a speaker could they hear the tape but eardrum or tympanum in frogs it's fairly obvious that near each one they came they were also capable of other frogs. sound plays an important role across and playing him a tape -G.T. in frog communication. Yet of another male calling. They * Previously AN!-! 8 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 -- Wingless A six-millimetre-long wingless scorpi��-fly scorpion-fly (Apteropanorpa ustra�ia s m sect f�_un� tasmanica): one of the first contams many cu11_os1- photographs ever to be taken AThe wingless scorp1?n­ of the species. ties. tasmat ica fl Apteropa norpa ! . scien- revealed healthy Apteropan­ 1sY such an oddball. · that orpa en 1t I t s own f am- populations at Lake tists have giv _ Augusta . Apteropanorp1dae. in the central high­ I1 y, the . . / lands, Mt Mawson, and Apteropanorpa tasmanica. 1s Mt from Tasma111an Wellington. In an exciting nly known development shrublan_d, where the specimens �!pine . from Lake Augusta proved to adults spend their hves _on small_ alpme belong to a new species, dou­ tlle snow or in bling ?th r w11 gl s the number of species plants. A �ew � � � � in the family! And the speci­ 111 a s1111ila1 scorpion-flies hve mens from Mt Wellington in the n?rth rn go environment � to show that thissmall, flight­ hemisphere but . sc1ent1sts that less insect can survive severe have always believed bushfires. Its unusual life his­ they are only distantly relat­ as tory probably contributed to ed. We can only speculate its survival. Apteropanorpa, ID to why some scorpion-fli�s unlike most Tasmanian �>- (order Mecoptera) los� their insects, spends the winter has � wings, but no doubt_ 1t months as an adult, basking 0 something to do with the in small shrubs and apparent- � combination of exb·emely sta­ ly feeding on moribund 8 ble, harsh and patchy envir­ insects on the snowfields. onment in which they are Wellington was subject to a ducted a survey of Aptero­ The larvae were spared from found. devastating bushfire in Feb­ panorpa with the intention of the bushfires because they Apteropanorpa tasmanica ruary 1967, and no speci­ mapping its distribution and probably spend summer deep was first collected in 1939 mens had been collected extracting its DNA to assess r in leaf litter and moss on the f om Mt Wellington (near from there since. Peter relationships with other scor­ ground. Hobart) and Mt Mawson (Mt McQuillan (University of pion-flies. -David Yeates Field National Park). Mt Tasmania) and I recently con- So far the survey has University of Queensland

a · a a e a e a f a . .ea . ica· A pl ce wher nci nt Ant rctic Beech trees Lamrn9ton cional Park is one Austr /10 ,s last 91 t sub -tiop J r inrorests!J' . I e . . a . 0 . , a e --l-111), I . a ,eais . an o trekkrn9, bird w cch1119 1 t k have been 9rowin9 q uietly f or some five thous ncl ) . You c B . . a . e . .. . 11 , I1 O'R e'JIi 's /enencl-.r v./ hosp1tahry. Cal xwrs1ons wnh our expert 9t11cles. . Or USL 1e I ox, it 'Y a f OfDD1LLV�RAINFDRESTGur.ST11ousE.n.n, ,.J. J e . � a e . 0 heie. s ec a e a a time yours l nol", J'r, 1. our sp ,· I 9 taw ,y r tes 1800 688 77- ·2 T k some . hncl I am,1181011 :va11011al Park Rd. 1•ia Ccrnun9ra. QJ_,eensland.

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Its, Lemming Latrines ith the approach of summer, Collared WLemmings (Dicrostonyx groenlandicus) living in the Arctic undergo a strange shift in behaviour. They have spent the winter below the snows, but now with the thaw there is a new reason for going underground. During the snow melt, these Arctic lemmings exca­ vate special chambers from their burrows in which they defecate. But why would they install the indoor plumbing now, having spent the cold winter months going to the toilet above ground (but beneath the snow)? According to Rudy Boonstra (University of Toronto) and colleagues, this seasonal shift in toilet habits may be related to predator avoidance, for once the snow has melted there is little cover available in the stunted tundra for a lemming, or its excreta. Concealing one's excreta is important for an Arctic lem­ ming, because their faeces and urine stand out like a glowing beacon to birds of prey, which can 'see' the droppings in ultraviolet (UV) light. This ability allows rap­ tors to scan a large area in a short time, concentrating their hunting to UV-signpost­ ed areas. The researchers speculate that with intense predation on lemmings over summer, from hawks, jaegers and claylight­ h u nting owls, there is a strong selection pressure on lemmings to 'hide' their fae­ ces and urine. By using underground latrines lem­ mings conceal their tell-tale waste and avoid alerting the watchful eye of airborne predators to their where­ abouts. -K.B.

The toilet habits of Collared Lemmings are dictated by their enemies. Silk Gift Wrapping accelerator mass spectrome­ the rats stowed away on a volcanic deposit on North ,-J,e use of gifts in try (AMS). The bones them­ the large canoe of early tran­ Island known to be 1,850 courtship is by no means selves were found mostly in I sient human visitors (or years old. As well as its AMS restricted to human ociety. deposits from the now-extinct of those who quickly died date being consistent with Just prior to copulation, predatory Laughing Owl out). that of the covering deposit, males of many insect species (Sceloglaux albifacies). Most Holdaway has found addi­ the bone's position beneath present their mates with a of the AMS dates were signif­ tional evidence for the early the undisturbed layer proves prey item, which the females icantly older than the gener­ arrival of New Zealand rats in rats were established in New ally accepted date for human proceed to eat. The male the form of a jawbone from a Zealand before the Taupo hunting spicier Pisaura rnirabilis settlement of the country, Pacific Rat excavated from eruption. and Holdaway uggests that also presents prey item as beneath the Taupo Tephra- -R.S. 'nuptial gifts' (the only spider

12 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 unting spider Pisaura The ma I e h fers to wrap his nup- m,r. a b'/', ,s pre . before presenting tial 91'ft 5 in silk female. them to the ;;;own to do so), but!? . ht 1111ra b,·1,·s prefers to wrap • gifts in silk before presenting them. Andreas Lang f1:om L_u d w!.g. Maximilians Un1vers1t-y m Munich, Germany, was mt�r­ estecl in the role �at the s1)k 'wrapping paper played_ 111 this copulatory transaction. In a series o� _l�boratory experiments he �rnbated se�­ ual excitement 111 male spi­ ders by exposing them to the silk threads of females. He then gave them a fly to wrap, varying the size of the fly, the nuh·itional state of the male spider and the amount �f time available to wrap the gift He and hungry males took also gave females fly heads The amount of silk pro­ with her longer than satiated males to duced by and increase his wrapped in varying amounts produce the males was gen­ chances of fertilisation. the same amount of erally small, suggesting of silk and timed how long it silk. The size that -G.T. of the prey item its nutritional value to the took them to digest their generally had little effect on female gruesome gifts. is negligible. Instead, the amount of silk used to it seems to Blue Balls Lang found that, when serve as a distrac­ wrap it, although small spi­ tion: the more silk males were given more time ders sometimes found a male t is quite common for the large used to wrap his gift, the males of seasonally to wrap their prey, they pro­ flies too b·icky to handle and longer I breed­ duced more silk. the female took to eat ing primate species to intensi­ Larger left these presents unwrap­ it, which would probably males produced more silk ped. give fy the colour of their genitals him more time to copulate during the mating season.

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Red-spotted Newts eat the eggs of other females but somehow manage to avoid their own.

This serves to advertise their tic behaviour can be a disad­ readiness to mate and has vantage-especially if your been found to be associated meals turn out to be your rel­ with hormonal changes. The doubling in testicle size increases atives. It is not surprising, However, male Patas Mon­ then, that some amphibian keys (Erythrocebus patas), the area of blue. This, coupled with the species are able to discrimi­ even though they have a nate kin from non-kin. restricted breeding season, monkeys' acrobatic displays, leaves Caitlin Gabor, of the appear to have a bright blue University of Southwestern scrotum year round. their competitors in no doubt about Louisiana, conducted a com­ To get to the bottom of the parative study between the Patas Monkey's blueness, females of two species of Fred Bercovitch from the what's on their mind. newt which lay hundreds of Caribbean Primate Research sticky eggs one by one and Center at the University of attach them to plant material. Puerto Rico conducted a function were not reflected by b·ast presented against the She found that, while female year-long study to determine colour changes. Even when snow white fur of their rear Red-spotted Newts (Noto­ whether there was, in fact, testosterone levels had end. This, coupled with the phthalmus viridescens) ate the any variation in scrotal colour soared and the testicles had monkeys' acrobatic displays, eggs of other females and and whether this was season­ doubled in size, the colour of leaves their competitors and avoided their own, female ally correlated with testicular the scrotum remained virtual­ prospective mates in no Smooth Newts (Triturus vul­ function. ly unchanged. doubt about what's on their garis) tended not to eat any Once a month Bercovitch So why be blue in the first mind. eggs at all but, when pressed, measured the colour of the place? Bercovitch believes -R.S. showed no preference for scrotum against a series of that for Patas Monkeys, even other females' eggs over their paint colour charts, as well as though their scrotal colour Newtritious own. the size of the testicles and doesn't intensify during the Eggs? The mechanism used by testosterone levels in each of mating season, the doubling female Red-spotted Newts to six males. He found that seas­ in testicle size increases the n a restricted environment, detect the difference between onal fluctuations in testicular area of blue and thus the con- I such as a pond, cannibalis- the eggs was not established,

14 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 that carry red WhY do veins blue? blood often look

t t bu he most likely explana­ t t mical marker ion is hat a chet t is present in he s icky sub­ t surrounds the stance hat t ests, Gabor eggs. In furthert t discovered ha femalet Red­ wts did no �void spotted t N� t eating hetr own ha chhngs.t s this is due to the fac Perhapt t tha hey no longer havet any tifying chemical agged ident t to hem. Pro ection from can­ as neces­ nibalism mayt not be sa ry in ha chlings because, they can being mobile,t t preda ion o some escapet exten . Whysome species and not t discriminate o hers tcan between heir own and other females't eggs is unclear. But fort hose tthat can't, the best op ion ist o keept eggs off the menu al oge her. -P.R.

Blue Blood ( e are all blue bloods. WOr so it would seem whent we look at the veins on he inside of our wrists. However, venoust blood is deep red and, un il now, no­ one has understood t quite why this op ical illusion occurs. t Lo har Lilge (from the Ontario Laser and Lightwavet Research Center a the University of Toronto) and tcolleagues immersed a clear ube of redt venous blood in a wh\tet fa ty solution whose op ical propert tiest are similar to _th� tissue ha surrounds vems 111 our own t bodies. They found tha , while the amount of red and blue light reflected from the t ttube of blood was less han hat reflected from t�e surrounding fatty solu­ t�on, the blood absorbed rela­ tively more red than blue making the 'vein' appear blu� wh en I compared to its sur­ ;! rounds. 'fhey al�o. found that a typi­ Besides providing the Sand­ (20-gram) blind Namib a 0.S-mtlhmetre-wide vein swimming Desert Golden Mole f oks t answer to an age-old mystery, (Eremitalpa granti namiben­ � red when i is 0.2 mil­ the researchers' findings may Moles sis) 1 etre or t t less below the have clinical applica ions. By has ta few ricks that sk1- �' but blue t t when it is 0 5 using the colour of a vein, it ife is ough in he shift­ enablet it o survive where its m1lhmetr e t 1. . be 1 ow. The deeper possible to es imate Ling sand dunes of the maint ermite foodt is widely a v mayt be t t �t _is, the bluer it looks Desert, sou h-wes ern dis ributed in pa ches. u' nt�I i he blood vessel's depth Namib t at is so deep we can't se� below the skin surface. Such Africa. Such a barren and dry Unlike mos other golden t all. This moles that typically search � also explains information could be useful, environment would not bet hY we blush t t for food by burrowing, the red, not blue­ for example, when trea ing expected o favour insect i­ th blood Namib moles run over the wh vessels that dilate vein malformations with laser vores-mammals with ypi­ t t n we blush are very close high requirements for surface of the sand a nigh . to ti t therapy. -C.B. cally t e surface of he skin. food and water. Yet the iny Their tracks are punctuated NATURE 15 AU STRALIA AUTUMN 1998 Further Reading Arikawa, K., Suyama, D. & Fujii, T., 1996. Light on butterfly mating. Nature 382: 119. Arnqvist, G. & Henriksson, S., 1997. Sexual cannibalsim in the fishing spider and a model for the evolution of sexual cannibalsim based on genetic con­ straints. £vol. Ecol. 11: 253-271. Bercovitch, F.B., 1996. Testicular func­ tion and scrotal coloration in patas mon­ keys. J. Zoo/., Lond. 239: 93-100. Boonstra, R., Krebs, C. & Kenney, A., 1996. Why lemmings have indoor plumbing in summer. Can. J. Zoo/. 74: 1947-1949. Gabor, C.R., 1996. Differential kin dis­ crimination by red-spotted newts (Notophthalmus viridescens) and smooth newts ( Triturus vulgaris). Ethology 102: 649-659. Heyning, J.E. & Mead, J.G., 1996. Suction feeding in beaked whales: mor­ phological and observational evidence. Contrib. Sci. Nat. Hist. Mus. Los Angeles County No. 464: 1-12.

Holdaway, R.N., 1996. Arrival of rats in New Zealand. Nature 384: 225-226.

During the day, the Namib Desert Golden Mole rests beneath the surface and lets its body temperature drop Kienle, A., Lilge, L. Vitkin, I.A., to that of the surrounding sand. Patterson, M.S., Wilson, B.C., Hibst, R. & Steiner, R., 1996. Why do veins appear blue? A new look at an old ques­ by short dips every five all, their daily energy require­ tion. Applied Optics 35: 1151-1160. metres or so, where they ment is about one-half. In this QUICK QUIZ Lang, A., 1996. Silk investment in gifts 1. What does the H in pH stand plunge beneath the sand, regard, the moles are more o like lizards than mammals. by males of the nuptial feeding spider for? apparently listening f r the Pisaura mirabilis (Araneae: Pisauridae). 2. What do Barnacle Bill, Yogi, sounds of buried insects. One might think that moles Behaviour 133: 697-716. When they find a patch of buried in the dunes would Flat Topand Barn-barn have food, they 'swim' through the have difficulty breathing, Lindquist, E.D. & Hetherington, T.E., in common? sand in irregular paths while because the loose sand press­ 1996. Field studies in visual and 3. Who was the Australian feeding. es on their body and there is acoustic signalling in the "earless" geologist and anti-Creationist Our recent measurements no tunnel system to supply Panamanian golden frog, Ate/opus zete­ at the heart of the 'Ark trial', of the energetic cost of loco­ fresh air. However, they have ki. J. Herpetol. 30(3): 347-354. held in Sydney last year? motion show that sand-swim­ several adaptations to deal ming is more than 80 times with this problem: their nos­ Newman, J.A. & Elgar, M.A., 1991. 4. What is the term for Sexual cannibalism in orb-weaving spi­ attributing human-like more expensive than running tril openings are sieve-like to ders: an economic model. Amer. Nat. the same distance over the qualities to non-human exclude sand grains, their 138: 1372-1395. surface. It is not surprising, dense fur holds the sand things? therefore, that the Namib away from their bodies so Seymour, R.S. & Seely, M.K., 1996. The 5. What does infection by the moles run on the surface they can inhale, and their low respiratory environment of the Namib bacterium Helicobacter pylori between food sources rather metabolism demands little Desert Golden Mole. J. Arid Environ. 32: cause? than sand-swim. On an aver­ oxygen. Most importantly, 453-461. 6. Which chemical element is age night, they run 1,400 the surprisingly large air metres compared to only 16 reservoir that exists between Seymour, R.S. & Schultze-Motel, P., represented by the symbol 1996. Thermoregulating lotus flowers. Hg? metres of actual sand-swim­ uniform dry sand grains per­ Nature ming. Still, their foraging 383: 305. 7. What is the name of the mits rapid diffusion of oxy­ effortsyield only 2.7 grams of gen. Oxygen levels near the sheep claimed, by a Scottish Seymour, R.S., Withers, P.C. & Weathers, termites a night, which would nose of resting moles turn research team, to be the first W.W., 1998. Energetics of burrowing, be insufficientfor most mam­ out to be scarcely different running and free-living in the Namib animal to have been mals their size. To cope with from that in the above­ Desert Golden Mole. /. loo/., Land. (in successfully cloned from an their low food availability and ground atmosphere. Oxygen press). adult cell? the high energetic cost of for­ supply during sand-swim­ 8. Do Koalas have a forward- or aging, Namib moles let their ming is also not a problem, rear-opening pouch? body temperatures drop to because as the moles move sand temperature while rest­ 9. What type of animals through the sand, the air sup­ ing beneath the surface dur­ transmit Lyme Disease? ply between the sand grains ing the day. This reduces is continually renewed. 10. What do Honey Possums eat? their resting metabolic ener­ (Answers in Q&A) gy demand to one-fifth that of -Roger S. Seymour normal mammals and, over- University of Adelaide 16 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 Established in 1985, the SW Wildlife Information & Rescue Service (WIRES) is the largest volunteer wildlife rescue organisation in Australia. WIRES works to rescue injured, orphaned and distressed native animals, caring for them until they can be released back into the wild.

In the last 13 years over 160,000 of Australia's native animals, from koalas suffering burnsfrom bushfire, to a snake caught in a drink can, have been res cued by WIRES. I ' JOIN FRIENDS certificate plus the OF WIRES satifaction of knowing Friends of WIRES you're helping to save our Mr/Ms/Miss ... are valuable supporters native animals and the Address... and contribute to the environment. ongoing costs of running ...... Postcode ...... MAKE A DONATION a wildlife rehabilitation Phone ...... organisation. Your financial assitance will aid WIRES in caring o Yes I would like to join Friends Of WIRES at $30.00 for a years subscription. For just $30 a year you for sick,. injured and o Yes I would like to help WIRES. Please find enclosed receive 'LiveWIRES' orphaned wildlife and my cheque/money order for a tax deductable published quarterly, full of donation of S ...... to give our wildlife one ensure the Organisation more chance. articles and news on continues to give our wildlife research, debates, o I would like to be involved in WIRES work. Please updates and rescue stories, precious wildlife one more send me more information. a special introductory pack, chance. Post this coupon to: Reply Paid AAA29 NSW Wildlife Information & Rescue Service (WIRES) and Membership card, PO Box 260 Forestville NSW 2087 L------.J ROCK DOVE THE BACKYARD NATURALIST (FERAL PIGEON) Columba livia

Like all those that make a killing Classification among concrete and neons, pigeons are no fools. Family Columbidae (pigeons and doves), one of 303 spp. worldwide and 25 in Australia.

Identification CULTURE'S Light blue-grey with iridescent purple and green on neck. Usually two bold black bars across wings. Beak black, VULTURES legs red, iris orange to red. Length 330 mm, weight 280 g. Sexes similar but BY SfEVE VAN DYCK female duller. Domestic varieties selectively bred for table, show and racing.

Distribution Feral in Australasia, southern Africa, the bre homing flock wheels in ... more vul­ Americas and J?> an. Native to Arabia, tures than messengers of peace. Most of India, Sri Lanka, Turkestan, Africa north these take-away junkies are scrawny of the equator, western Asia, runts, with feet clubbed by pigeon pox, Mediterranean region, eastern Europe, their rickets-twisted toes marking time Shetland Islands, Faroes, Scotland and until mercifully amputated by falling Ireland. (No-one knows if pigeons came crockery, their feathers greasy and clot­ with the First Fleet to Sydney, but by ted.They slip and stumble over saucers 1833 trap shooting was a well­ and forks, knocking cream-streaked established sport there.) UST ACROSS FROM THE cm CEN· tumblers aside as they hammer their TRE, on the banks of the Brisbane River, open beaks onto leftovers, packing Food lieJ four or five Sphinx-sized concrete scraps down their necks and plastering Mostly spilled grain. One Canberra blocks waiting, as it were, for a their faces with mud cake and cold study (Frith 1982) revealed: grain 40%, Herculean artisan to chip them into chips. bread 28%, garden and weed seeds something memorable. To the cultured, Then, as sure as eggs, they'll make for 31%, miscellaneous (chewing gum, the complex is the 'Cultural Centre'; to the ground where, before an audience of orange peel, one pearl button, rat the cynical, the 'Cultural Bunker'. Italian shoes and chipped cups, they'll droppings) 1%. However, to the local pigeons the site deliberately copulate until the blushing represents a coup de theatre, an unex­ diners at the next table turn their chil­ Reproduction pected gift of limestone and gravel flow­ dren toward home, scrape their plastic Breeds all months, but mostly Aug.-Dec. ing with caviar and chicko rolls. chairs back, and leave. (Probably only one-third of urban popu­ Visitors looking for a seductive intro­ The attraction of pigeons to cement lation breeds.) Flimsy nest of sticks, duction to Brisbane culture are not dis­ and stone has its origins in a genetic roots, grass, rubbish in warehouses, appointed if they dare to dine at one of mortar that set hard in the rocky cliffs of bridges, roof ledges, towers, turrets, the unnetted outdoor cafes. Almost the the Middle East 120,000-310,000 years piers. Both sexes incubate 2 white eggs moment a scraping chair broadcasts the ago when Rock Doves (Columba Livia) (35-43 mm long) for 17-19 days. intention of a patron to leave, the som- first appearedin the fossil history. Young leave nest at 31-35 days old. Pairs capable of raising 4 or 5 clutches annually.

That natural beginning has taken them on their own wings following Neolithic grain-growing humans grunt­ ing their way from India and Spain up to Scotland in the north and the Gulf of Guinea (Africa) in the south. And since their domestication for food around 4,500 BC they have piggy-backed their way to southern Africa, the Americas, Japan and Ausb·alasia to form home-and· away flocks, the constituents of which are a select feral cocktail distilled from fancy domestics that were bred from the basic Rock Dove prototype. There has never really been a social, cultural or environmental conscience associated with releasing pigeons Pigeons can breed all year round. Here a male tries to convince a female that he is the best man for the job. 18 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 r around the w_orld, whether it be f om straw-lined wicker baskets or centre­ stage at the Oly_mpics. �en �xploit�? as message earners, their homing abili­ ty and spered demanded they see their freedom f equently and, although these qualities were bred to perfection in the 19th century (Reuter's famous news agency was founded on news-carrying pigeons in the early 1850s), they were employed long before that. In 44 BC, when Mark Antony held the city of Modena under siege, Decimus Brutus se nt messages out attached to pigeons, which he hoped could skirt the nets set up by the attackers to snare them. If yesteryear's breeders of racers or fancy varieties could not bring them­ selves to eat their rejects, they could always abandon them to fend for them­ selves in the sb·eets. Those street flocks no w cost their indulgent provisioners plenty. For example, Trafalgar Square's famous flocks cost the British public £100,000 annually-the price of mopping up the tonnes of acidic marble-melting coo-poo, installing disincentives like electric zappers and needle beds on splattered statues and nest-clogged Although pigeons can be a nightmare for council workers and outdoor diners, for many they ledges, and hand-feeding them grain represent an entertaining distraction from their otherwise sterile city existence. laced with contraceptives or strychnine. The thing that strikes anyone who ing hands which, as kids, we slid under Kings, as well as Dragoons, Scanda­ watches pigeons in the park, however, is sitting pigeons to rob them of their eggs. roons, Modenas, Jacobins, Tumblers, that they, like all those that make a Many pigeon studies have revealed Red Antwerp Smerles, and Blondinettes killing among concrete and neons, are that, in cities around the world, flocks with beaks so short they can't feed their no fools. People who have tried to fright­ stick to a certain beat and there is very own babies. Some fanciers in Bali and en them off with loud noises, high-fre­ little exchange (less than 25 per cent) Lombok take pigeon appreciation a few quency whistles and artificial hawks are between the individuals in those discrete steps further and slip little brass bells the first to testify bands. This may and bamboo flutes around their homers' that pigeons soon explain why a lunch­ necks to fill the sky with tinkling and learn to give the time walk away from panpipe whistling. greasy eyeball to the Cultural Centre Feral Rock Doves are always going bogus threats. Their In 44 BC, when and across Brisbane to be either a love or hate affair. While capacity to watch River's Victoria one person enjoys sitting on a park and imitate what Mark Antony held the Bridge will reveal a bench feeding their lunch to a pigeon, another pigeon does flock . in Anzac an hour later someone else sits rapt at to obtain food city of Modena under Square;the members an office window watching a Peregrine means that waves of of which are as glow­ Falcon tear the same bird apart for its learning sweep ing, lusty and proud lunch. But, on the subject of pigeon rapidly through a siege, Decimus Brutus as the brass Diggers lunches, if it's a Brisbane lunch with a flock, enabling the whose heads and garnish of Culture you are after, head members to exploit sent messages out shoulders they poop for an unnetted cafe every time. The ne w food resources all over. antics of the Rock Doves might be and deal more effi­ attached to To lunching city engrossing, but the pouting, po_sturin_g ciently with tucker. workers, shoppers and preening of the cultured dmers 1s For example, the pigeons. and toddlers, pigeons a hard act for even the pigeons to appalling ones in the provide a cherished follow!• Cultural Centre distraction from the have taken almost bleak sterility of the Further Reading no time to learn how urban heart. And to a Simms, E., 1979. The public life of the street pigeon. t� deliver a deft flick of the head under rich miscellany of residential eccentrics Hutchinson: London. big yellow serviettes to check for dis­ they provide a hungry family of recog­ cretely covered scraps lurking plates more grateful and far Crome, F. & Shields, J., 1992. Parrots and pigeons of on nisable individuals North Ryde. underneath. less complaining than any human flock Australia. Angus and Robertson: And, contrary to their endearing . of children. 1982. Pigeons and doves of Australia. Rigby: reputation as birds of peace that peck Outside the city parks, pigeon-love cul­ Frith, H.J., �w Adelaide. ay at food furiously instead of fight­ minates at events like the Royal Easter mg, the Cultural vultures have learned Show where genetic enginee_ring b�nds that, by extend to show ?ff its ach1e_ve­ Jonston, R.F. & Janiga, M., 1995. Feral pigeons. Oxford ing their wings over their over backwards University Press: New York. a ackss like· archangels ' they can clobber ments: White Fantails with balloonmg crap-nval with up front the bir?s stagger d . the closest wing and chests so Dr Steve Van Dyck is a Curator of �ye. it from a crust-littered table top. around unable to see the Judge that Vertebrates at the Queensland Museum 1 1s is reminis Pouters long and top-he_avy th cent of the sharp blows prods them, where he has worked since 1975. at were often dealt out to small thiev- like albino toffee apples, huge edible NATURE 19 AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 the annual fire regime was vital for the RARE & ENDANGERED species' survival in the Park but, without convincing data, management of the area could not be changed. So, in e sites, all So brilliant is the grasshopper that in 1991 . . January 1992 Lyn_selected fiv_ became familiar carrying populations . of Le1chhardt's it was featured on a stamp and Grasshopper, and momtored them care­ to many Australians. fully. Within two years fires had burnt into four of the sites, and the grasshop­ pers in them could no longer b� found. To this day the grasshoppers still occur on only one of Lyn's original sites and LEICHHARDT'S this is the only one protected from fire by being surrounded by large expan es GRASSHOPPER of bare sandstone. So what now? Leichhardt's Grasshop­ BY PENELOPE GREENSIADE & LYN LOWE per has been nominated for inclusion on the IUCN List of Threatened Animals and a recovery plan should now be pre­ pared. This requires an accurate map of its total distribution, both within and outside the Park, to be drawn up. From photograph the insect. Sadly, however, this, sites with secure populations can the grasshopper has disal?peared ti:om be selected and given protection from most of these sites, due to mappropnate fire. Additional attempts could also be fire regimes. made to breed the grasshoppers in cap­ A few years ago one of us (Lyn) tivity (previous attempts have failed) for became suspicious that the annual burn­ possible reintroduction to sites with suit­ ing of Kakadu's vegetation, widely car­ able habitat. ried out in the region to reduce fuel Apart from Lyn's studies, nothing else loads, might be having a damaging is known of the species' biology, EICHHARD'lS GRASSHOPPER effect on Leichhardt's Grasshopper. Lyn although chemists Bill Kitching and (Petasida ephippigera) was once to ento­ noticed that the flightless juveniles Mary Fletcher from the University of mologists, as Lasseter's Reef was to a hatch at the end of the wet season in Queensland are studying chemical goldminer, the holy grail. One of the March. They climb the stems of the aro­ aspects of its relationship to Pityrodia earliest collections of the species was matic shrub Pityrodia jamesii to feed on plants. They are especially interested in made in 1845 by the explorer Ludwig its leaves, and grow slowly during the whether the grasshopper may retain in Leichhardt in what is now Kakadu dry season, undergoing five moults its body some of the chemicals con­ National Park. Leichhardt was no doubt before finally emerging as fully winged tained in its aromatic food plant. So far drawn to the grasshopper because both adults in December. After mating, the Leichhardt's Grasshopper has no known males and females have spectacular females lay their eggs and the whole predators; perhaps it assimilates chemi­ orange and blue colouring. So brilliant is cycle begins again. However this natural cals from the plant that may make it dis­ the grasshopper that in 1991 it was fea­ cycle, which is seasonally tuned, is tasteful or even toxic? Perhaps these tured on a stamp and became familiar to being interrupted by the European chemicals contribute to the grasshop­ many Australians. But because the method of managing fuel with fire. per's bold colouration? Fortunately Leichhardt's Grasshop­ per is not yet lost and there is time to rectify the damaging effect that So far Leichhardt's Grasshopper has no known predators; Europeans have had. But there are other species, some as yet unknown, that may also be gradually disappearing perhaps it assimilates chemicals from the plant that may as a result of inappropriate fire regimes. What is vitally needed are fire regimes make it distasteful or even toxic? Perhaps these chemicals that are custom-designed for each vege­ tation type, locality, land use and so on, contribute to the grasshopper's bold colouration? each of which has, as its aim, the pro­ tection of all the elements of biodiversi­ ty present. Until we have Australia cov­ ered by such fire regimes, we may con­ region of the wet-dry tropics to which it tinue to find that, no sooner do we make Burning is normally carried out in new discoveries, than we are destined to is restricted was remote, further collect­ May or June, when juvenile grasshop­ watch them slowly become extinct.• ing trips to search for it were rare. As a pers are most vulnerable, being unable result the absence of records after the to move quickly into shelter. Even if mid 1850s suggested it might be extinct. some do manage to find shelter from Further Reading It wasn't until 1971, after nearly 120 fire, the foliage on their host plant is Lowe, L., 1995. Preliminary investigations of the biol­ years, that the species was rediscov­ burnt so they almost certainly starve to ogy and management of Leichhardt's grasshopper, ered. death. The current burning regime Petasida ephippigera White. /. Orthoptera Res. 4: Although also found in three other using fire bombs from the air is quite 219-221. localities in the wet-dry tropics, the different to that practised by the original Penelope Greenslade is an entomologist � grasshopper is best known from inhabitants who were on foot and proba­ g§ Kakadu, where tour operators once halt­ working on soil animals in CS/RO, bly only randomly burnt smaller patches Canberra, and Lyn Lowe is a biologist with � ed at places where they knew it could be of the lowlands. � found to allow visitors to admire and CSIRO's Tropical Ecosystems Research It was obvious to Lyn that a change in Centre in Darwin. 20 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998

have the leathery phyllodes (modified WILD THINGS leaf stalks functioning as leaves) that characterise most Australian wattles, and they have all evolved from Aust­ Because the fossil record is so meagre, we will ralian ancestors that somehow dispersed overseas. Wattle seeds have very hard never know the fullextent of Australia's contribution seedcoats (an adaptation to fire) and to ecosystems overseas. they probably survive well at sea. Australian colonisers are most strong­ ly represented on nearby islands to the north and east. Sulawesi, for example, one of the larger Indonesian islands, MADE IN boasts eucalypts, grevilleas, macada­ mias, cuscuses and cockatoos, to name a AUSTRALIA few. New Zealand has hundreds of plants, birds and insects of Australian origin. They include Manuka (Leptosper­ BY TIM LOW mum scoparium) and Kanuka (Kunzea ericoides), two shrubs that arrived in New Zealand so recently (probably hun­ dreds of thousands of years ago) they kauiensis). Honeyeaters and monarch have yet to evolve into separate species. flycatchers followed the same migratory Ironically, their Maori names have been path, island-hopping their way across adopted in Australia to describe the orig­ the Pacific, evolving along the way into inal Australian populations. Some of New an array of colourful forms. Zealand's unique birds, such as the New Few Australians are aware of the Zealand Robin (Petroica australis), are USTRALIA UESMORE TI-IAN extent to which our plants and animals obviously descended from very similar 7,000 kilometres from Hawaii, but it has have colonised other parts of the world. Australian ancestors, and Australian managed to exert a profound influence There is a popular notion that Australia birds continue to colonise New on Hawaiian ecology. The mountain (defined here as including New Guinea) Zealand-Silvereyes (Zosterops lateralis) forests in Hawaii are dominated by wat­ is an evolutionary backwater, where flew across in the 1850s, Masked tles of Australian origin, and inhabited primitive lineages have survived in isola­ Lapwings (Vanellus miles) in the 1930s, by birds that also originated here. tion without contributing to the richness and Welcome Swallows (Hirundo neoxe­ The common Hawaiian wattle tree, of the rest of the globe. The wattles na) in the 1950s. These colonisers may the Koa (Acacia koa), is very similar to (genus Acacia, subgenus Heterophyl­ eventually evolve into unique New Blackwood (A. melanoxylon), a tall wat­ lum) show how limited this view is. Zealand species. In New Caledonia a tle found in eastern Australia. The seed There are in fact 18 wattles with foreign very common tree is the Broad-leaved pods of Blackwood, or a close relative, distributions, found in such distant lands Paperbark (Melaleuca quinquenervia), were evidently borne to Hawaii long ago as Madagascar, Mauritius, the the same species that dominates swamps on ocean currents, there to evolve into Philippines, Taiwan, Vanuatu, Fiji, in eastern Australia. Its seeds may have Koa, and a second Hawaiian wattle (A. Samoa and Hawaii. All of these plants blown across the sea.

n :� a �: :�;�� c��l;t:tpaka i� H�kwa ii , has a wi�e di_stri_buti_on in the lndo-Pacific region. It has escaped ori e i from cultivation to become a weed in an, an d 1s Il e Y l ot extend its d1stribut1on throughout the 22 At lantic tropics. NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 teristi Sticky Hopbush is a charac cally Australian plant that can be seen throughout much of the world, as for example, here in the Everglades National Park.

A smaller, bul still significant number of Australian plants and animals has spread much farther afield, into South­ East Asia and the more distant islands of the Pacific. South-East Asia, for instance, is home to the Coast Sheoak (Casuarina equisetifolia), Cajuput Tree (Melaleu ca cajuputi), Hairy Goodenia (Goodenia pilosa), and the White-breasted Woodswallow (Artamus leucorhynchus), which also occurs in Fiji. But a couple of our plants have done much better than this, achieving spec­ tacular distributions that girdle the globe. One of these is the Sticky Hopbush (Dodonaea viscosa). Hopbush­ es (Dodonaea species) are very charac­ teristic Australian shrubs that the pio­ neers used as hop substitutes when brewing beer. Most of the 70-odd species are confined to Australia, but Sticky Hopbush has somehow managed to escape these bounds and has colonised every continent, except Antarctica, and many islands including Madagascar, New Zealand and Hawaii. In many countries it has been adopted as a folk medicine, and in Hawaii its leaves are used to make leis. To me it repre­ sents a little piece of Australia that I often encounter on travels overseas. I have seen it growing on sand dunes in India, on granite hills in South Africa and in Slash Pine (Pinus elliottii) forest� in Florida. �other globe-trotter that presumably ongmated here is Devil's Twine (Cassytha filiformis). Of the 17 species of Cassytha, 15 occur in Australia, and 13 are only fo�n_d here, so Australia is prob­ ably the ongmal home of this plant. It is now a common creeper of beaches and woodla_nds in warmer regions of Australia, Africa, Asia and the Americas, �nd also grows on many islands includ­ ing, once again, Hawaii. I have seen great thickets of it trailing over Water Sheoak, owes its success to its habit of Australia. And the recent discovery in Pear (Syzygium guineense) trees on the growing on beaches, and to develop­ southern Queensland of the world's old­ �anks of the Zambesi River in Zim- ment of seeds that survive lengthy est known passerine fossils suggests abwe, at a crossing point used by ele­ immersion in salt water. that Australia may have been the evolu­ phants. In Florida it often grows over Because the fossil record is so mea­ tionary starting point for more than half �terns of Sticky Hopbush, perhaps show­ gre, we will never know the full extent of the world's birds-the song birds (order m� that expatriate Australians like to Australia's contribution to ecosystems Passeriformes) .• stick together. overseas. Although it is easy to specu­ Sea Fanflower (Scaevola taccada) late about a few plants and birds that Further Reading fo und on trop1cal · beaches as far":".e�t as ' have dispersed recently, it is much more Boles, W.E., 1997. Fossil songbirds (Passeriformes) Afriea and as far east as Hawan 1s a difficult to develop the larger picture, from the Early Eocene of Australia. Emu 97: 43-50. th1rd,· very widespread to reconstruct dispersal events from s · · plant that pre- and Pedley, L., 1975. Revision of the extra-Australian umabl. Y ongmated here. It belongs in a many millions of years ago. Recent work fa mi1 Y that species of Acacia subg. Heterophyllum. Contrib. Qld _ (Goodeniaceae) and genus that on birds, however, suggests Herb. 18: 1-84. ai e overwhelmingly contribution may be very w . Australian and. Australia's h1le th ere are many fanflower ' much larger than any of us have expect­ Sibley, C.G. & Ahlquist, J.E., 1985. The phylogeny and fo u species id overseas, nearly all of them grow ed. DNA studies in America indicate that classification of the Australo-Papuan passerine birds. on each fo_und p es· or on islands in the Indo- several groups of related birds Emu 85: 1-14. acifi 1c !·eg1on, suggesting the world-the shnkes A . descent from around Tim Low is an environmental consultant, us. trahan ancestors. with waterborne (Laniidae), crows and jays (Corvidae), f uits. Th others-evolv d natural historian and author of four books ; ere can be little doubt that Sea orioles (Oriolidae) and � on wild foods and medicines. "anflower, like Devil's Twine and Coast long ago from a lineage that arose m NATUR E AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 23

O YOU REMEMBER WHICH shaped pads on the ends of lheir lingers animal featured on the and toes that help lhem hold on, and Australian one-cent coin, these can provide enough grip for before it was made Feathertails to run across vertical panes redundantD in 1991 (the one-cent coin, of glass-a feat almost as tricky as that is; not the animal)? Would you even holding on to trunks of wet gum trees. recognise the animal in that one-cent The tail of a Feathertail is held out portrait? Long whiskers and big eyes, stiffly at a slightly upward angle as the and a strange-shaped tail. The tail, of animal glides, presumably acting as a course is the key. The animal is a rudder and brake. When moving along Feathertail Glider (Acrobates pygmaeus) the branches, the animal drags its tail and its scientific name, meaning 'little along leaves and branches, thus acrobat', is very apt. providing some support and security. It Feathertails are small (11-15 grams) can also roll its tail up in a downward possums that have two special curl to carry leaves for nest-building. adaptations for gliding from tree to tree. Feathertails are the only marsupial Like other gliding mammals, they have gliders to sport a feather-like Lail. The a gliding membrane or patagium, which only other animals that have similar tails in Feathertails extends from the wrist to are the non-gliding Feather-tailed the ankle. Unlike other gliders they Possum (Distoechurus pennatus) of New have a flattened tail with a single row of Guinea (the Feathertail's closest living long stiff hairs down each side, giving it relative), and the pygmy scaly-tailedr a feather-like appearance and giving the squirrels of West and Central Af ica animal its name. Armed with these (which are not marsupials). adaptations, Feathertails are fearless in The small size and nocturnal habits of the trees, running along the flimsiest Feathertail Gliders make them hard to branches and leaping from branch to observe, and they are rarely seen. They branch. They are 'extended leapers' are most often encountered when cats more than 'gliders', but they are capable bring them to their owners to show off, of long glides between trees (20 metres or when people find them when is not unusual). They have large heart- collecting firewood. However, they are

actually fairly common in the tall forests of eastern and south-eastern mainland Australia, although less common in woodlands on the inland side of the Dividing Range. They do not occur in Tasmania; presumably there were never enough trees on the Pleistocene land bridges 15,000 years ago that linked Tasmania to the mainland for these and other forest-dependent animals to cross over. EATHERTAILS, LIKE MOST GLIDERS Ai D Fpossums, are totally dependent on forests _or woodlands. They need them to provide food to eat and places to live. Because they are small, very active mammals, Feathertails need high­ �nergy foods like nectar and pollen, and mve�-tebrates. They have been observed feedmg at Yellow-bellied Glider (Petaurus australis) sap-sites, and they also eat some fruits and seeds. Eucalypt is ea e ail li e is Th F ee i llen th rt G d r f d ng o t d a ksia e of H h Ba (Banksia ericifolia). �rees often flower profusely and are i is es ee i a s Aft r it f n h e i:;;a a �t � f d ng t thi infl:r::� e s an es :,:\' y c rry po e a ksia important sources for many of these l in in llina n n on it fur to oth r b r u t g po tio . n , foods, bul olher plants, like banksias, 26 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN !998 - -

,,

(Gyinnobeli­ By grooming themselves between bouts of which produce large quantities of nectar or Leadbeater's Possums Gliders not only remain deus leadbeateri) do, and the only foraging, Feathertail and pollen, can also be important. clean, but they also get a feed. They collect Bec social unit appears to be a fur. au e _Feathertails visit many flowers recurring and eat any pollen that gets stuck to their �ach night, they are potentially mother and her adult daughters. . help each other in raising portant pollinators in Australian Perhaps they ' tore s Nature Aust but we don t really know. The 1997 ts ( ee Summer young, -98). best forests for Feathertails are are _In addition Feathertails probably mature ones where there to providing in itli_ foods, for several eucalypt species that vary ; eucalypts are important a �ir hollows. Many Australian forest their flowering seasons. This provides ots of animals , ·me I ud' mg most of the possums year-round food supply and l and glid for potential nest sites. ers,. antec. h' muses ' phascogales' hollows I)at s ' a vai ·iety . Feather tails also make use of artificial of birds and also bees ' popular use h0 II ows ·Ill . cavities in their habitat. One . trees for ra1s111g young is Lhe �USt as safe . provider of artificial cavities places in which to shelter'. In ?�sh e' th�y do hollow telephone company, Telstra. i 1 find a suitable our c1t1es, F l iertads build forn� o( � areas on the edges of h!� a nest in the from pole lo �f eucalypt leaves (somet11nes telephone lines are strung sua the roadsides, and wherev�r �� !·1na and/ or acacia leaves) about pole along 1s l siz is a connection to a house there of � softball, with a fist-sized there boxes inf n f terminal box. These terminal !r � cavity. Up to 16 Feathertails a r Lo Lhe ha' e een consist of a metal f ame boiled . found nesting together' bul e thick inlet gl oups are · pole, which supports b�th t� · typically of three to five 111 from Lhe an ma 1 nd . and outlet wires commg h �· ? occasionally singletons conneclio1�s T. ey con l form stable social groups bottom, and the fine-wire l k ' Over the lop of this I e Sug ai. Gl'I d ers (Petaurus brevicefJs) projecting upwards. 27 NATU RE AU STRALIA AUTUMN 1998 With its gliding membrane, or patagium, from wrist to ankle on each side, a Feathertail Glider can glide 20 metres or more. The stiff tail-up posture is typical in a glide.

sits a moulded plastic cover, about 22 centimetres high and 9 x 7 centimetres FEATHERTAIL GLIDER in section. What better real estate could Acrobates pygmaeus a homeless hollowless Feathertail find? Warm, dr y and with a tight entrance Classification hole that excludes most of the Family Acrobatidae (which includes only 1 other species, from New Guinea). competition! Feathertails sometimes use the terminal boxes and build their Identification nests in the space above the wires. The smallest gliding possum, about 15 cm total length (half of this is tail). Gliding They do not appear to cause any membrane from wrist to ankle on each side of the body; distinctive tail with a flattened damage, apart from an occasional short middle core and a single row of long stiff hairs down each side. Grey-brown above, white circuit, so the conb·actors who maintain to cream below, very long whiskers. the wires for Telstra look on Feathertails as a nuisance to be Habitat and Distribution tolerated, not as a pest. Widespread in forests and woodlands of eastern and south-eastern mainland Australia. The fact that Feathertails will use Found on both sides of Great Dividing Range, from near the top of Cape York through to artificial nest boxes has proved to be the Grampians in Vic. and on into the east of SA. very important to scientists like myself. ll is important because Feathertails Behaviour usually won't enter conventional small Nocturnal and forest-dependent. Builds communal nests in tree hollows, emerging soon mammal live-traps, such as those used after dusk to forage, typically alone, but large numbers feeding together have been to study other forest mammals like recorded. Feeds mostly on nectar, pollen and invertebrates. pygmy-possums, antechinuses or rodents. We don't know why Reproduction feathertails shun traps, but it means we In southern Australia, breeding strictly seasonal with births between July and January. have to rely on other ways of catching Mothers typically produce 2 litters of 2-4 young within this season, and embryonic diapause occurs. The young have relatively slow growth and development, with pouch life Feathertail Gliders nest in tree hollows and lasting about 65 days, followed by about 40 days in the nest before young are weaned. one of the main ways people encounter them is when collecting firewood.

28 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 ---

them. The best technique we have is to partially formed. The pouch young stay intermittent, and the embryos are install nest boxes in areas of forest, and permanently attached to the teats for reactivated, to be born soon after the hope that Feathertails will use them. We about 65 days, by which time they are previous litter is weaned. It is a then check the nest boxes during the about 1.7 grams and are getting too big remarkable system that ensures that day and catch any Feathertails that are for their mother's pouch. At this stage the second litter of a season is born as nesting in them. Nest boxes seem to their eyes are still shut and they have early within a breeding season as is work best in middle-aged forests, where only a fine covering of fur, but they are possible. there aren't so many natural hollows, left in the nest while their mother goes The second area of research is on but the trees are mature enough to out to feed, returning at intervals to patterns of torpor in Feathertails. When supply food for the Feathertails. suckle them. About 40 days later they checking nest boxes on cold days (not However, even in these forests, only weigh 8-8.5 grams and are weaned. The just in winter), it is not unusual to find a about ten per cent of nest boxes get mother can then give birth, almost ball of cold sluggish Feathertails that used by Feathertails. immediately, to another litter of young slowly turn into warm bundles of because of a remarkable series of energy. These animals are in torpor, a ECAUSE EST BOXES ARE OUR O LY events that occurred earlier in the cycle. strategy for conserving energy that Breliable way of catching them, two Within a day of the previous litter being involves lowering the body's internal areas of research on Feathertails have born, she mated again and a series of thermostat, dropping the heart rate and predominated. The first area is their eggs were fertilised. These fertilised becoming unresponsive. The body reproduction, since when you catch a eggs developed normally for a few days, temperature typically drops to a couple mother in a nest box, you also catch her but then entered a period of delayed of degrees above the outside young. In southern Victoria they have a development called embryonic diapause temperature, but never drops below 2° strictly seasonal breeding pattern, but (similar to that found in many C. Such bouts of torpor may just be the season is probably longer in kangaroos, and also in some rodents during the day, or may last for several northern populations. Up to four and shrews). This diapause is triggered days on end. Caroline Jones and Fritz (typically two or three) tiny young are by the sucking stimulus of the previous Geiser from the University of New born at a time. Each weighs about 18 litter in the mother's pouch. As these England recorded bouts lasting up to milligrams and is smaller than a grain of young approach the stage of being five-and-a-half days. However, Feather­ rice. Their eyes and ears are only weaned, the sucking stimulus becomes tails are not true hibernators.

30 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 A Feathertail Glider feeding on a eucalypt blossom. Note the expanded toe pads on the back foot.

Most recently, Lindsay Aitken and John Nelson from Monash University described the anatomy of the ear and the_ br�in of Feathertails (and New Gumea s Feather-tailed Possum) and found them to be quite different to ?ther marsupials. In their ear canal, just m front of the eardrum, there is a disk Feathertails are fearless in the trees, running along the flimsiest branches at night in their hunt of bon� that occludes most of the space, for insects, nectar and pollen. Truly a pygmy acrobat. an�. this appears to reduce the hearing ability of Feathertails at most 'normal' Ward, S.J., 1990. Life history of the Feathertail Glider, fb'quencies, but possibly enhances their Further Reading Acrobates pygmaeus (Acrobatidae; Marsupialia). Aust. ihtyat low . brain, M.R. & Frey, H., 1984. Aspects of the natural J. Zoo!. 38: 503-517. � frequencies In the Fleming, P gmaeus) in e lat�r of feathertail gliders (Acrobates J: ; al lobe is i:nassively expanded history and gliders, ed. by here Victoria. Pp. 403-408 in Possums Ward, S.J. & Renfree, M.B., 1988. Reproduction in it connects with the nerves to the Sydney. ossibly ear s A.P. Smith & I. Hume. Surrey Beatty & Sons: females of the Feathertail Glider, Acrobates pygmaeus �rr·p associated with the ' (Shaw) (Marsupialia). J. Zoo!., Land. 216: 225-239. tenng �ystem. W why daily e don't know CJ. & Geiser, F., 1992. Prolonged and F eatherta1ls ring Jones, Acrobates pygmaeus have such a filte torpor in the feathertail glider, Dr Simon Ward is a lecturer in the syStem. Perhaps these low frequencies J. Zoo!., Land. 227: are (Marsupialia; Acrobatidae). Department of Zoology at the University of made by important natural 101-108. Melbourne. His research is mostly on the P�edators of Feathertails such as the of the reproductive ecology of sin.all marsupials, wmg-b ats of one V. 1984. Eucalyptus pollen in the diet and � owls. Thi� is just Turner pygmaeus (Marsupialia: particularly possums, gliders more mtr·igum · Feath�rtail Glider, Acrobates antechinuses, but also seab-irds. g area of research into Res. 77-81. F'eat hertail Gliders that beckons us.• Burramyidae). Aust. Wild/. 11: 31 NAT URE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998

ENTION THE WORD MINER effects of mallee clearing, wildfires, and and many people automat­ hybridisation with the widespread ically think of the intro­ Yellow-throated Miner (M. flavigula) duced Indian or Common have put the Black-eared Miner on the MynaM (Acridotheres tristis). But this bird critically endangered list. Fewer than is totally unrelated to the Australian min­ ten pure individuals are thought to ers, which are honeyeaters in the genus remain in the wild. Manorina. In a case of mistaken identity, The Bell Miner or Bellbird (M. early European settlers noted the bare melanophrys) is the most distinct of the patches of yellow skin around the native four miners, with its attractive green birds' eye and named them after the plumage and recognisable 'clinking' call. species they were familiar with. It lives in the sclerophyll forests of There are four species of Ausb·alian south-eastern Australia. The Noisy miner, one of which-the Black-eared Miner (M. melanocephala), which in­ Miner (Manorina melanotis), from habits eucalypt woodlands in eastern north-western Victoria and neighbour­ Australia, is more similar in appearance ing regions in South Australia-is to the Yellow-throated and Black-eared Australia's rarest bird. The combined Miners, although it can be easily distin-

guished from these. �ile Bell, Noisy and Yellow-throated Miners are all relatively common in their respective habitats, populations of the Bl�ck-eared Miner started to decline just pnor to World War 1, following the wide­ spread clearing of its mallee home for whe t farms. � , Today, however, the ?pec1�s greatest threat is loss of genetic identity through interbreeding with the Y�l�ow-throated Miner. Indeed, some cnt1cs h?v� raised the question of how much limited conservation funding should be allocated to a species that is �!ready extensively contaminated genet­ ically. In the past, under natural conditions,

Mic�ael Miller (from Healesville Sanctuary) settmg up a mist net in the Wyperfeld _ National Park in order to catch hybrid Black­ 34 eared Miners for the breeding program.

NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 the Black-eared and Yellow-throated A hybrid Black-eared Miner feeds its young. Miners were reproductively isolated. Their different habitat preferences identification of pure birds. Generally, formed a barrier to dispersal. The Some critics have raised the Black-eared Miner is darker m aggressive Yellow-throated Miner likes colouration and smaller than the Yellow­ more open habitats whereas the shyer the question of how much throated Miner, with an extensive black Black-eared Miner favours denser face mask and little or no yellow coloura­ mallee. However, following extensive tion. Field guides differ as to the number clearing of the mallee, the Yellow-throat­ limited conservation of distinguishing features, al�hough ed Miner expanded its range at the wildlife ecologist John McLaughlm (who expense of its Black-eared relative. This funding should be has monitored the bird and its require­ increased the number of points of con­ ments for nearly a decade) has deter­ �ct between the two species, resulting allocated to a species mined there are at least 17 plumage in a genetic 'swamping' of the Black­ characters that separate the two species. eared Miner. Being behaviourally inter­ that is already extensively Nevertheless, many are subtle and mediate, hybrids were able to penetrate require careful examination in the hand. the thicker mallee habitat and become contaminated genetically. Based on the similarities between the incorporated into the more secluded two miners, and the fact that they are colonies of Black-eared Miners, further able to produce fertile hybrids under tainting the gene pool. natural conditions, some scientists sug­ The various grades of hybridisation gested that the Black-eared Miner was certainly complicate the positive field simply a colour variation (or morph) of NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 35 Some of the differences between hybrid Black-eared Miners (left) and Yellow-throated BLACK-EARED MINER Miners (right) are so subtle they require Manorina melanotis careful and close examination. Classification Order Passeriformes, family Meliphagidae. the more common Yellow-throated Miner and did not even warrant sub­ Identification specific status. However, there are prob­ Av. length 25 cm, black face mask, grey crown, dark rump. Rapid and repeating lems with the application of this 'biologi­ scolding call. cal species concept'. Modern molecular techniques have revealed that natural Habitat hybridisation between otherwise dis­ Mature mallee eucalypt woodlands, unburnt for more than 40 years. Tall chenopod or tinct species occurs in numerous red-swale mallee preferred, with an understorey including Acacia and Melaleuca spp., instances and therefore, by itself, cannot small bushes, shrubs and hummock grassland (Triodia spp.). be viewed as sufficient evidence forcom­ bining two species as one. Distribution According to proponents of the 'phylo­ Formerly found throughout the Murray Mallee region. Current distribution centred around genetic species concept', an understand­ Murray-Sunset and Wyperfeld National Parks in north-western Vic. and Bookmark ing of evolutionary history is the critical Biosphere Reserve in SA. factor in determining species limits. At the Museum of Victoria, Les Christidis Behaviour and Breeding and Janette Norman used a molecular Generally quiet and shy; does not rigorously defend territories. Breeds between Sept. approach to assess the Black-eared and Dec., in cooperative colonies of less than 10 birds. Lays 3 eggs on average in bulky, Miner's level of genetic differentiation in cup-shaped nests 2-4 m above ground. relation to other miners. In one of the first Australian cases to use DNA tech­ Diet nology to address classification and con­ Invertebrates and nectar, mainly from eucalypts. servation issues, they established beyond doubt its status as a distinct Status species. Critically endangered. SING A PROCESS CALLED 'POLYMERASE U Chain Reaction Sequencing', differ- 36 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN !998 Bell Miner

(Manorlna rnelanophrys)

Yellow-throated Miner (Manorina flavigula)

vi ffi Bi :::;"' Black-eared Miner :::,c.. (Manorina rnelanotis) V,z 3 0u � QC <( :,:: �0 z 0 8'.i :s � w :,::>- :,::>- ----­ 3 Noisy 8u Miner :::, 0 � QC � � >- :,:: u zS< S< z <( QC � � t,; :::, <( �0 V, 0 coQC w :,::>- 12 w 0 5 u e atuc � mm G: /� i w >-:,:: ·· �• •/, � ::E .-;::.::- .... 0 ,?, f,' V, z As a result of extensive interbreeding between Yellow-throated and Black-eared Miners, photographic material of pure Black-eared 0 Miners is extremely rare and an illustration is the only reliable way to clearly display the differences between the species. �>- This illustration will help you to differentiate between Australia's four native species of miner. V, �

NATUR E AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 37 br Given the Black-eared Miner's dependence on mallee, unburnt for more than 40 years, a major management priority is fire protection.

a recent common ancesto�. ' The ences between species are highlight�d share Bell Miner displays the most vanat1on, through measuring the sequence vana­ and tion in their genes. In the case of suggesting it was the first t� diverg� _ . a separate species. This 1s hybrids, DNA from wit�in _the n�cle1 of become understandable considering it is the cells is unsuitable as 1t 1s subJect to The recombination (the coming together of most distinctive in appearance. other three miners appear to have two different sets of genes during sexual rela­ reproduction), thus making it too diffi­ diverged from each other over a cult to identify which genes come tively short period of time. from a which species. The most interesting find is that, on Situated outside the nucleus, mito­ genetic level, the Bl�c�-ear�d Mi�er chondria are tiny biochemical power exhibits even more vanation, 111 relation plants that energise our cells and pos­ to the Yellow-throated Miner, than the sess an independent, circular DNA mol­ Noisy Miner does. This is surprising and ecule. This is passed on intact through shows that appearances can be deceiv­ the female line, which means all off­ ing, given that the Noisy �iner is the spring possess their mother's mitochon­ easiest of the three to recognise and was drial DNA A hybrid individual therefore therefore expected to exhibit the great­ contains only the mitochondrial DNA of est genetic difference. As the Noisy and the female parent-either the Black­ Yellow-throated Miners are universally eared or Yellow-throated Miner, but not recognised as separate species in their both. own right, the Black-eared Miner All living organisms carry the same deservedly warrants species status. four DNA building blocks (nucleotides or bases) within their genes. It is the pre­ cise ordering of these bases in a double HESE RESULTS QUALIFIED THE MINER helix that determines the genotype Tfor research funding to determine (genetic make-up) and phenotype (phys­ its conservation requirements. The ical appearance and traits) of an organ­ Black-eared Miner Recovery Team, ism. Closely related species share many coordinated by the Victorian Depart­ common patterns and are differentiated ment of Natural Resources and by sequence variations. Environment, is managing the research The researchers extracted mitochon­ and restoration effort. In Victoria at drial DNA from cells at the base of feath­ least, suitable habitat has already been ers and compared corresponding sec­ identified and all known colonies are tions from the various miner samples. wholly or partly within conservation DNA sequences from the Noisy and Bell reserves or State forest. An action state­ Miners, with their distinctive patterns, ment, under the Victorian Flora and were easily recognised. Among the Fauna Guarantee Act, will give special Yellow-throated Miner results, several legislative protection to known and DNA haplotypes (or genetic variations) potential habitat in this State. were recorded, largely corresponding to Given the Black-eared Miner's depen­ A Yellow-throated Miner displays its the various subspecies (M. f flavigula, dence on mallee, unburnt for more than distinctive throat markings. lutea, pallida and obscura). When it 40 years, a major management priority is ty of the species. It serves as insurance came to the 17 available hybrid samples, fire protection. Other species requiring against total loss and hopefully will pro­ using a process of elimination, the mature-age mallee also stand to benefit vide enough birds for the restoration of Yellow-throated Miner patterns were from both the reservations and the sup­ wild populations. This poses a challenge identified and what remained, in two of pression of wildfires. Current research as cooperatively breeding birds have the samples, represented the genetic is looking at Black-eared Miner threats, rarely been held and bred in captivity. signature of the Black-eared Miner. social organisation and breeding sys­ However, after the first breeding season, To further verify this as the correct tems. The results will assist in the devel­ two hybrid young successfully fledged code, the researchers examined feathers opment of field techniques to curtail and valuable nesting data are now being from the Museum's preserved speci­ hybridisation, increase colony productiv­ obtained. mens of pure Black-eared Miners, some ity and establish possible systems for the The long-term aim is to de-list the more than 80 years old. Unfortunately, translocation and reintroduction of species as endangered and achieve a the extracted DNA was highly degraded birds. self-sustaining wild population of at least and could only provide short stretches, A captive breeding program is under 100colonies of ten birds each (pure or at which proved largely unsuitable for way at Healesville Sanctuary in Victoria, least close to the Black-eared Miner phe­ analysis. (New methods of replicating with the aim of back-crossing and active­ notype). They would need to be suffi­ these smaller DNA fragments are cur­ ly selecting towards the Black-eared ciently dispersed so as not to be wiped rently being developed.) Miner phenotype. According to the pro­ out in a single natural disaster but in Similarities across all the DNA results gram's coordinator Michael Miller, this close enough proximity to allow for showed that the four miner species will help to maintain the genetic integri- interbreeding between colonies.

38 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 In � positive development in 1996, sur­ Group) and land owners, among others. Further Reading veys m South Australia managed to locate Members of the community are encour­ Backhouse, G., Bennett, S. & McLaughlin, J., 1995. many _ previously unknown hybrid aged to report sightings and can also vol­ Recovery plan for the Black-eared Miner, Manorina c�lomes, primarily in the Bookmark unteer for field work. Interested parties melanotis. Department of Conservation and Natural Biosphere Reserve. The birds appear to can contact the Threatened Bird Network Resources, and Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union: be close to the Black-eared Miner pheno­ at Birds Australia*. Melbourne. type and possibly include a handful of In light of the support network that is Fitzherbert, K. & McLaughlin, J., 1991. Black-eared pure individuals. Four females from the now in place, along with early captive pop Miner. Manorina melanotis. Flora and Fauna Guarantee ulation were captured in February breeding success and the location of addi­ Action Statement No. 26. Department of Conservation 1997_ and these have joined the nine tional hybrid colonies, the future of the and Natural Resources: Melbourne. hybn?s, from Victolia's Wyperfeld gene Black-eared Miner, currently teetering on pool, m _the captive breeding program at the brink of extinction, is looking a lot McLaughlin, J., 1996. Cheating extinction. Wingspan Heales�1lle. In a further protective mea­ more promising. DNA technology played 6(3): 6-11. sure, B1rds Australia an important role in solving the taxonom­ _ (formerly the Royal *Dr Les Christidis is a molecular biologist and Australasian Ornithologists Union) ic puzzle and determining that, as a recently Head Curator at the Museurn of Victoria. He purchased the pastoral lease of a species, the Black-eared Miner wa� in uses molecular techniques to trace the evolution­ Property containing a significant number desperate need of preservation. ary relationships of Australasian birds and has of the colonies, adjoining the reserve. Conservation genetics is a growing area an interest in conservation genetics. Tess !he preservation of the Black-eared of research and molecular techniques are Holderness is a science journalist and reporter �mer is very much a collaborative revolutionising the field of taxonomy. based in Melboume. Any sightingsof Black-eared 1n effort ' voI vm· g birdwatchers, zoos, govern- They provide an additional and valuable Minersmay be reported to Birds Australia, 415 en Riversdale Rd, East Hawthorn, Victoria 3123, [ t_ departments, funding agencies 0ike tool, especially for addressing controver­ nvironment Australia Biodiversity sial cases like this one proved to be.• ph: (03) 9882 2622. NATUR E AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 39

A common characteristic of orb-weaving spiders is that females attempt to capture and consume their male suitors before mating takes place. MAYBE SIZE DOES COUNT BY MARKA. ELGAR

AUSTRALIA AUTUMN orb-weaver Nephi/a plumi OST PEOPLE, AT ONE TIME The golden pes. or another, have bumbled into the vast webs of our Providing an ligrams. In contrast, the 16-millimetre­ large orb-weaving spi- long males of the nocturnal garden orb­ ders.M The lucky ones will have stopped explanation for the weaver Eriophora transmarina, often short. But others may have had that found in suburban backyards, are not unpleasant, and sometimes sticky, expe­ relatively diminutive size that much smaller than the 22-millime­ rience of a face-to-face encounter with tre-long females. the rather large resident spider. of the males of many How do we explain this difference in Whatever our reactions to these spiders, size between females and males? they are still very much smaller than us. orb-weaving spiders has Natural selection may favour larger Imagine then, the problems facing male females because they can produce more golden orb-weavers (Nephila spp.) or eggs and therefore enjoy a greater banded orb-weavers (Argiope spp.), fascinated biologists for reproductive success. On the other which can be as little as a tenth the size hand, males may improve their repro­ of the female. over a century. ductive success by mating with many Providing an explanation for the rela­ virgin females, which is most easily tively diminutive size of the males of achieved by being among the first to many tropical and subtropical orb-weav­ achieve sexual maturity. And smaller ing spiders has fascinated naturalists males may mature earlier than larger and biologists for over a century. Male males, thereby promoting greater sexu­ orb-weaving spiders are always smaller and is among the largest of our orb­ al size dimorphism. While these argu­ than their female counterparts; howev­ weaving spiders. Females grow to a ments provide a general explanation for er, the difference in size between the length of 35 millimeb-es, can weigh over why male spiders are smaller than sexes, or sexual size dimorphism, varies 800 milligrams and spin webs that female spiders, it seems insufficient to widely in this taxon. An extreme exam­ exceed one meb·e in diameter, while the account for the extraordinary sexual ple is the golden orb-weaver Nephila males are considerably smaller, growing size dimorphism of some orb-weaving ptumipes, which is commonly found in to little more than five millimetres and spiders. The answer may lie in their mat­ the eastern coastal regions of Australia weighing a relatively modest 17 mil- ing behaviour.

:;e male and female of the garden orb-weaver Eriophora sp. court on a mating thread that is spun by the male.

NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998

.i1

NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 The orb-weaver Araneus diadematus is a diurnal spider that is common in Europe and North America, and often occurs in relatively high densities.

COMMON CHARACIERISTIC OF ORBWFAVING web, hesitating briefly before venturing Aspiders is that females attempt to onto the orb-web proper. The orb-web is capture and consume their male suitors where the female captures her prey and, before mating takes place. Why females not surprisingly, the male traverses very behave this way is still not fully under­ cautiously across it toward the central stood; the behaviour is curious because hub where she is waiting. If she the female risks not having her eggs fer­ responds to his movements, perhaps by tilised.But whatever the reason for why orienting toward him, he pauses for sev­ it occurs, pre-mating sexual cannibalism eral minutes. We discovered that seems to have important implications for females invariably responded to larger the size of males. Darwin was certainly males, some of whom were subsequent­ convinced of this, quoting the observa­ ly eaten, but never reacted to smaller tion by the Rev. 0 Pickard-Cambridge, males. This result suggests that, for this an esteemed arachnologist of the day, species, natural selection (by sexual can­ that the male is " ... so small as to be a nibalism) favours smaller males and sort of parasite upon the female, and hence supports Pickard-Cambridge's either beneath her notice, or too agile explanation for the extraordinary and too small for her to catch without degree of sexual size dimorphism in this great difficulty". species. Recently, my former student Babette However, this explanation is faced Fahey (now at Harvard University) and I with a problem because sexual size tested this idea by staging courtship dimorphism is not so great in other sex­ encounters between females of the gold­ ually cannibalistic orb-weavers, such as en orb-weaver Nephila plumipes, and the larger nocturnal garden spider males of different sizes. Once a mature, Eriophora transmarina or the small diminutive male locates the web of a Enamelled Spider (11raneus' bradleyz). female he moves along a support thread The issue can be resolved by consider­ from the surrounding vegetation to the ing where on the web courtship and mat­ ing take place. Males of these spiders do The tiny male Nephila must traverse the not venture onto the orb-web, but orb-web to reach the female waiting at instead construct a 'mating thread' that the central hub. is suspended between the structural NATURE A USTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 45 The larger female Araneus diadematus (right) threads of the web. The male attracts expected in species that mate at the cen­ hangs from the mating thread that was spun by the attention of the female by hanging tral hub because smaller males are less the male. He strums the thread with his third Erom the mating thread and strumming likely to be cannibalised by females. In pair of legs and strokes the female with his it like a harp. Eventually, she walks onto contrast, it will be less pronounced in relatively long, front legs. his mating thread, somewhat precari­ species that mate on a mating thread ously, and the male strokes her with his because smaller males are more likely long front legs. He then takes a final to be cannibalised. This broad predic­ leap from the mating thread to the tion can be examined by collating infor­ female and copulation occurs, providing mation on the size of males and females she doesn't capture him 'mid-flight' and and the location of mating for many dif­ make a meal of him. My earlier experi­ ferent species of orb-weaving spiders. ments with the European orb-weaving The prediction seems to be upheld; sex­ spider Araneus diadematus, which also ual size dimorphism is more pro­ mates on a mating thread, revealed that nounced in species that mate at the hub females were better at capturing smaller than those that mate on a mating thread. males. For this species, larger males are more likely to mate and reproduce than l;l'I-IOUGH THESE STUDIES T LL U WHY � . smaller males, and hence sexual size Athe degree of sexual size chmor­ dimorphism is not so great. phism might differ between species of The results of these experiments sug­ orb-weaving spiders, they can't tell us gest more general predictions about the much about the evolutionary progres­ patterns of sexual size dimorphism sion of these differences. Generally among species of orb-weaving spiders. speaking, species of spiders with small Considerable sexual size dimorphism is females have small males and species

46 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 ;,, ! -'i: ? X X �-' ,. A' x, �( >{ ,)( X � ,\ �-.._ : A � -'I.

\/

.'k . _.;,.

Golden orb-weavers (Nephila spp.) form large aggregations. Each spider rests in its own web, which may sometimes be attached to other webs.

mature earlier may enjoy more repro­ use a mating thread. Of course, the ductive success. The evidence for this explanation is only relevant for orb­ argument is not particularly convincing, weaving spiders that are sexually canni­ however, and a recent analysis of the balistic. But for these species, the ques­ phylogenetic relationships of spiders tion of size mainly becomes an issue of with large females also have large paints a rather different story. Jonathan either discretion or brute force.• males .. Thus, we can't be sure why, over Coddington, from the Smithsonian evolutionary time the difference in sex­ Institute in Washington, and colleagues Further Reading ual si ze dimorphism arises between have shown that, for golden orb­ Coddington, J.A., Hormiga, G. & Scharff, N., 1997. species. Is it because the size of females weavers, females tend to be much larger Giant female or dwarf male spiders. Nature 386: but not males has changed, or the size than their ancestors, while males are 687-688. of males but not z females has changed, either the same si e, or also larger. Thus Elgar, M.A., 1991. Sexual cannibalism, size dimor­ or beca z �se both have changed? the difference in sexual si e dimor­ phism and courtship behavior in orb-weaving spiders The i ssue is controversial. Fritz phism between species reflects a change (Araneae). Evolution 45: 444-448. Yollrath from the University of Aarhus in female, not male, si ze. Why females 1� D enmark claims have increased in size, however, is not Elgar, M.A. & Fahey, B.F., 1996. Sexual cannibalism, i that the diminutive s ze of males of some species is the explained. male-male competition and sexual size dimorphism in re.suit of evolution toward smaller size. Where does this leave the sexual can­ the orb-weaving spider Nephila plumipes. Behav. £col. 7: 195-198. H,s explanation has nothing to do with nibalism story? In general males of s�xua\ cannibalism, species that mate on the hub are a si ni­ iz but rather that large ! Vollrath, F. & Parker, G.A., 1992. Sexual dimorphism � e d1morp z . hism is expected in species lar si e to those that mate on a mating and distorted sex ratios in spiders. Nature 360: which males �� suf.fer ?igher mo�tality thread. This too suggests that the differ­ 156-157. an females, resultmg 111 a population of ence in size dimorphism arises through core females than males. changes in female size; as females have Dr Mark Elgar is a senior lecturer in the ?nsequenlly, become larger (for whatever reason), Department of Zoology at the University of tit. 1 �� b there will be little compe- etween males for mating oppor- selection through sexual cannibalism Melbourne, where he teaches animal behav­ unities, which in spiders has simply suppressed any associated iour and evolutionary biology. He has a t is usually won long-standing research interest in the mat­ . Y the larger male. Thus large z increase in male size for species that im si e is not ing behaviour of spiders and insects. portant and smaller males that mate at the hub but not for those that

NATUR E AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 47

other frog species in the south-west, HERE ARE FOUR SPECIES OF 'TICK­ which live throughout huge areas, often ing frogs', in the genus Geocrinia, I set out to examine spanning distances of more than 1,000 found in the rank kilometres. So, why are ticking frogs dif­ swamps of south-western genetic differences ferent? How have four species of ticki TAustralia. At first glance, all four species ng frogs evolved within the same area that are small, brown and nondescript. most other frog species range through­ However, when you flip them onto their between populations backs, their true colours shine through. out? Their bellies have colours peculiar to within each ticking frog This is not a trivial question, nor is it each species, and these colours are the purely of academic interest. The basis of their scientific names: vitellina, species. With this as answers have practical applications in egg-yolk orange; rosea, rosy pink; alba, the fields of species management and white; lutea, yellow. my goal I leapt into conservation biology. Conservation of Male ticking frogs call from shallow wild species involves more than just spherical burrows beneath leaf litter. making sure that some individuals sur­ They build their burrows in the damp the swamps. vive. Species are dynamic. They interact soil beside streams or in soaks. Their with one another and their environment. call is a series of rapidly repeated clicks Species undergo genetic change; they or ticks (hence the name 'ticking frog') diverge and evolve. Maintaining those and is used for attracting females. dynamics is an important goal of conser­ Female ticking frogs lay up to 30 eggs in vation biology. Therefore, to conserve a the burrow and the larvae stay inside mary reasons that White-bellied Frogs species, the evolutionary processes of the burrow until they transform into (G. alba) are considered the most that species need to be maintained. To frogs. The tadpoles don't eat anything endangered of the four species. The safeguard a species' ability to evolve, we and must survive to reach metamorpho­ Orange-bellied Frog (G. vitellina) is also need to know how it has evolved in the sis on the energy reserves provided in an endangered species. Local catastro­ past. So, one of the questions I asked in the egg yolk. This reproductive strategy, phes, such as disease, could at once my PhD research was how have ticking known as direct development, is quite wipe out this entire species because it frogs evolved? different to most other frog species, . has an extremely small distribution: it many of which lay hundreds or thou­ lives in only six creeks, within an area of SET OUT TO EXAMINE GENETI C sands of eggs in water, and have free­ six square kilometres. I differences between populations with­ swimming, feeding tadpoles. Tiny geographic distributions are in each ticking frog species. A popula­ Their unusual mode of reproduction characteristic of ticking frogs. All four tion is all of the frogs in a particular renders ticking frogs particularly vul­ species have separate ranges between nerable to soil disturbance. Trampling the towns of Margaret River and Ticking frogs breed in densely vegetated by livestock or clearing of native vegeta­ Walpole, an area that spans only 200 swamps with acidic, black soil. Here the tion churns up the soil, often with catas­ kilometres. The domain of each species author is shown marking the end of a survey trophic effects on the resident frogs. is minute, spanning from four to 70 kilo­ transect to examine the impact of fire on the Land clearance and grazing are the pri- metres. This is in stark contrast to most Karri Frog.

t N

0 30 • G. alba Scale (km) • G. vitellina • G. rosea

• G. lutea

50 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN !998 ...... NATU RE A USTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 51 How to identify ticking frogs? Shown here are the ventral (belly) and dorsal (back) views of all four species of ticking frogs, which can be distinguished by their ventral colours: Geocrinia alba is white or pale yellow (first row); G. vitellina is egg-yolk orange (second row); G. rosea is usually pink or orange (third row); G. lutea is muddy-yellow or red (bottom row). Male G. rosea and G. lutea have black chins.

52 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 -

S each species consists of many swam P ' o . hold species together? Patterns ulations. I 1opeI d th·1s genetic the genetic within groups were so different that the taxo­ loca_. 1 pop data helped me answer this nomic ch would provide an evolutionary question. status of the Karri Frog is now app a being reconsidered: 0 :i°e1 that might apply at the broader Within each species there it may consist of 1 the four were a two distinct species. The southern 11eog, ·aphic scale of .specie s. numbe1: of distinct groups, or clusters clus­ g 1 I I eap t · 1 of ter of 'Karri Frog' populations all With this as my goa mto t 1e populations. Populations within a cluster had a were more similar different form of one gene compared swamps. . . . · to each other than with all the populations typical licking �rog sw�mp 1s a b·1 ?ac 1 they were to populations in the north. A . in other clus­ This complete genetic change .ee( 1 line' sometimes with a d1st11 ct ters: What's more, these clusters took Ci ·1 · 1 of pop­ place over a distance of only two kilo­ c,.ee 1< cllannel. The soi 1s usua.11 y bi ac. 1 < ulations often abutted, creating very a C 1 . · metres. There were other remarkable with peat, and supports IStmctiv_e, sharp genetic changes over very short genetic ble tangle of plants. clusters within each of the tick­ am1 o St ·,mpenetra . di tances. An analogy might be clusters ing frog species. For ?wamp peppe 1 .mint of cities example, nine pop­ These include in European countries. ulations of the Walpole lutea) (Agonis linea1folia) and razor-edged Although the Frog (C. citiesr within the same from the lower reaches of (Lepidosperma spp.), all country differ the Frankland sword sedges _ f om rone another, they River had no genetic variation er with entangling creep­ are not as dif within the bound togeth r ferent f om one another as genes examined, and appeared identi­ ers and spiny wattles. I spent hundr�ds they are f om the cluster of cities in the cal. These made a bold and_ contrast with of cold and wet, or w�rm mosqL11to­ adjacent country. Walpole Frog populations from a _behmd a cone The most f rther ridden, nights c!·ouchm? r spectacular split within a upstream, and from the adjacent creek, of yellow t?rch light, wa1t111� for fr??s _to ticking f og species was between the which had variation for several genes. ray their whereabouts wit� the11 dis­ northern and southern populations of Why? bet rosea). How could these broad-scale tinctive 'tk tk tk tk tk tk tk. call. The the Karri Frog (C. These two groupings within species have formed? crenetic technique I used required only a ;mall tissue sample,r so I w�s able to all of the f ogs to their swamps return TICKING FROGS unharmed. . . . Later, in the lab, an 111cred1�le picture of diversification emerged. W1th111 ea�h Classification genetic l o ch e c n ro species there were enormous r Fami y My batra ida . 'Ti ki g frogs' include the four spe�ies in t_he Geocrinia sea differences between the frogs f om sep­ complex: Karri Frog (G. rosea), Walpole Frog (G. lutea), Wh1t_e-bell1ed Frog _(G. a/�a), arate swamps, even for swamps less than Orange-bellied Frog (G. vitellina). The taxonomy of G. rosea 1s currently bemg revised one kilometre apart. I found some fo�ms because this taxon may represent two distinct species. of genes only in a single population, while I found others in two or three pop­ Identification adjacent swamps. For such ho te l i e ent e in olo an i le s en ll th n he ulations in S r r egs, d ff r bre d g bi gy, d a s mp r adverti_ �m t_ ca a ot r frogs massive genetic differences to exist, the in the genus Geocrinia. Geocrinia l�ai i� th� only other Geocrm,a_sp. m so, uth-west WA frogs in separate swamps must be and it has a two-part 'RRRRit nik mk mk mk' call rather than a simple tk tk tk tk tk tk almost completely isolated from each tk'. All ticking frogs have allopatric distributions (see map). Calls of G. ro�ea and G. lutea te e o on o h n G. other. Dispersal among swamps would are difficult to distinguish, but have slower pulse ra s, and a� m re c tmu us, t a spread the genes, thereby preventing vitellina and G. alba. Geocrinia vitellinaten ds to have fewer ticks per call than G. alba. the build-up of genetic differences. Thus the big genetic differences told me that Ventral Colouration le llo a these frogs tend to reproduce in the Geocrinia vitellina, egg-yolk orange; G. alba, white, or pa ye w w s G. r , n e hi1 �;a o same swamp as their parents and so, usually rosy pink, but also black, white, grey and ora g ; G. lutea, usua mu II w, e le o � e t when new mutations arise, they are t l o black, white, grey and blood r d. Ma s f G. rosea and G. /�tea av a 1 ack bu a s l o o es ch e unable to spread to other populations. chin. Inter- and intra-specific variation in ve�tra c l urs sugg ts this aract r may e ol t n Genetic estimates of movement can be not be adaptive but, rather, a quirk of v u io . problematic because there are usually alternative ways of interpreting the data. Habitat n i t So I sought a more direct estimate of the oa in e n h d p p · t (Agonis finearfolia) a d a var e y e Br d dra ag l_i �� �)� �;�: S hi h i c tent a hi h disp h n 1 1 1 �:i� i�il;r :�: organ c on , nd g est rsal tendencies of ticking frogs. I of other uma -m b g p s us h a g c n e o · . se e e Geocrinia rosea and G. recaptured hundreds of individually e t e of all s�ecies a b f un 1 wat ar as d nsi i s � 0 e =�� ;f�� c e� he e marked White- and Orange-bellied l o occ n ow, st�ep- 1d er _ oad r ks w re sword s dges lutea a s ur m arr � t ro ee c e l e in Frogs and distance pp e o n eocrm,·a' sea br ds away from r ek in s e measured the (Lepidosperma s .) ar d mma . b n ottin lo s te tween their capture site and their pre­ high-rainfall areas, usi g r g gs as burrow i s. vious release site. It quickly became apparent that these frogs don't move Biology e e . o e spe ie presumed similar. v ry far at all. In many cases I knew l o l o alb 1 'd Au -D c th r c s Ca l fr m Ju y t Jan. Eggs °!/ � i o t oil o ttin lo (G. rosea which e el ent i p en��al bi;row �· m is s , r ro g gs frog I was about to capture simply Direct d v opm . E�gs _a, m s o by c tc e G vitellina G. rosea 24, G. lutea 13.2. N its location in the swamp. I caught onl e si s. _al a 11.8, e n e y). Averag lu h z �- � �ts � alba), e n on temp�ratur . G. on frog a en l c e et o phos s d s (G. d pendi g I within the same square metre p ta ar . M am r is 10 it e s e e epo 1t . on a l of r o i c a t y 3 y ar aft r gg d s 1 ; du ts ,. swamp in four successive years! The n G. vitellinamaj r ty rea h xu I Y a ur o no n alba a d n ta lon e it d unk w . majority i ate in ee in se verag:) ·' max . g v y 6 years. Fo of frogs moved less than five partic p 1.5 br d g aso s metres between years . . Does this l explain how four species of Status to a t t e t tion n e e l c tic .t1c . l n n e e h bi a fragm n a a d r c �t o a king frogs have evolve in a ly e da r d due all o l ons h managed to Geocrinia a/ba---cn n c. i lo s ee p pu ati ave t�e sou i n e ti ons c e � II b hab tat s . Thr sm th-west? By having stay-at-home pop � x ncti aus d i l n i atin ete io t n c i te ulat e o o 1op � ��� ! ; y i d c g d r ra i g l ma . dispositions, have e o t en bv u s s, oss b o e these frogs simply u m the abs c f ll i i ion an ll n e b� di d lne le e t ·ts sma d str but d sma umb r f n isolated in different areas and rab du t loc l o l t on tincti n oth Geocrinia vitellina---vu n ec e bu a p pu a i ex o s of b diverged to lat1ons Geocrinia rosea a d G f;u e a-s ur e become different species? pop� · . in · i neces P rha e 0 n oin on to s sary. ps. But if that were true, why pec e t g g m i r g hav s i s sugg s en't all of the populations in separate swamps become t separate species? Wha 53 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 b The answer to this question was critical for eye colour, there were three alterna­ to understanding how these species tive forms-black, brown and green. evolved. The climate was relatively wet, so the Common ancestry was the most likely hese frogs don't frogs were able to move between the solution. All of the separate populations three swamps. This dispersal continually that have a similar genetic make-up do mixed the three eye-colour genes among so because they stem from the same move very far at all. the populations. Then the climate began ancestral population. For this to happen to dry out. The frogs could no longer there must have been an historic period I caught one frog within traverse the dry bush between swamps, of range contraction, leaving only a few and so the three populations became refuge populations. These refuge popu­ the same square metre isolated from each other. Some time lations formed the seeds that gave rise to later, a year of unusually dry conditions many new populations when the range drastically reduced the number of frogs of swamp in four _ expanded. The offspring of the ancient in each population. Through chance it refuge populations form the genetic successive years! happened that in one population only clusters that are evident today. In North green-eyed frogs survived. As condi­ America, the genetic record of past dis­ tions continued to dry out, two of the tribution changes is well documented in populations became extinct, leaving only amphibians, birds and mammals. In the or to contract. the population with the green-eyed northern hemisphere, range changes The combined action of genetic frogs. This is a critical stage in this evol­ have generally been driven by the expan­ change in isolated populations with long­ utionary scenario; the genetic difference sion and retraction of extremely cold term range changes can cause signifi­ r between the refuge population (green conditions during past ice ages. In cant evolutionary shifts. So ticking f ogs eyes) and the original set of populations Australia, a lack of water may have had exist under highly potent conditions for (black, brown and green eyes) will deter­ the same consequences a the over­ evolutionary change. Consider the fol­ mine the magnitude of evolutionary abundance of ice in the northern hemi­ lowing hypothetical scenario. At some change. The difference could be even sphere. Cyclical changes in rainfall may time in the past, there were three greater i( a mutation occurred in the expand or deplete available habitat, caus­ swamps, each with a population of tick­ refuge population to produce, say, red ing the frogs to spread out over the land, ing frogs. For one particular gene, say eyes. 54 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 Of the four ticking frog species. the White­ . ur ive in both the long and hort term bellied Frog is the most endangered. 1 gr�duall_ hedding light on why some peoe of arr_iphibian have declined. throughout the � uth-we t in much the Each pec1e of ticking frog incorpo­ srun wny that mo�t other pecie are rate many characteri tic , and those to�ny.. Howe r. with an increa ingly fea�� �ncompa far more than ju t and -lunate. their range would ha their l:icking call and coloured bellies. - ntrac�ed t the wetter area with ui: �ey have _an exciting and complex evol­ ab\e refuge · TI1e frog in each of the e u tionary h1 tory. It i a hi tory of move­ r_efuaes had a�t1y different characteri . ment �oug� an ancient landscape:geo­ ti �� hteh -�� cliff rent belly colou , and phic wax.mg and waning. combined gi:a . �htly differen_t ticking all ) . giving \\1th e oll1:tio�ary change ly genetic n_ e t the specie� that _we now recog­ tud_y of_ ticking frogs empha ise the rn� e. Range hancre mce that time fa_ cmatin� complexity of pecie in the have pr ?u�ed �ub tantial genetic diver­ w11?- pec1e not only carry \Vith chem gence \\1thm all the ticking frogs. and �eir body form. but al o a deep evolu­ �iay yet lead to the evolution of addi­ tionary_ hi tory. They are interwoven in tional �pecie . dynamic and ongoing evolutionary proce_ e . Tooe proce are inextric­ H ON ER\"ATION IMPLICATION OF ably tied to the land on which a particu­ � lar pecie ha evolved. Cut tho link . T. th1 e olu�onary proce are pro­ _ found. onne tion of native egetation and an Lmportant characteri tic of that between wan1p. are e ential for range pecie would be lo t ju t a urelv a taking the tick out of ticking frogswould hange and divergence to continue. render them impoveri hed hadow of �ven if ti kin° fro,,, are ah ent from par­ their former lve . Therefore, ro con- b ular wan1p . tho e ite and the inter­ erve a peci . it link with the land vening habitat may be critical in their from which it prung mu t be retained. ontinuing ebb and flow. The range of Although keeping a pecie in a zoo i the \\nite-bellied Frog ha been evere­ ?etter than it complete extinction. tick­ ly fragmented by clearing for grazing mg frogs how that the entire e senceof land. Fra2"lT1entation mav have no im­ a pecie can only be retained in mediate impact ince under the current the wild.• climatic condition mo t population em to be naturally i olated. What' Fu·rther iReadhn1g more, during increa ingty dry condition �riscoll, DA, 1996. Undff5Wldingthe mEtzMJY!i;;­ natural decline are expected a local tionstTuduTe of frogsin the Gaxrini21 rmeawmplex population die out However, in the through population ge11eli10'- Continuing research 55 IATUP.E AllSiRAILIIA Al!Jllll!JIM!l D9'%

Amanda Vincent travelling through fishing villages in the Philippines in order to collect information on the seahorse trade.

half the year. The female s�i,_ns in a much larger area bu� v1s1ts her pregnant mate each 1:1or�mg. Toget�er they perform a_ ntu�ltse� greeti�g dance, promenadmg with lmked �Ils and circling a seagrass shoot like maypole dancers. After the male h�s given birth, however, the dance 1s prolonged into full-scale cou_rts�ip, lasting up to nine hours and culm1�at111g in remating. These seahorses will not even acknowledge non-partners. The more I learnt about seahorses, the more I worried about their conser­ vation status. As I travelled the world, I kept encountering piles of dead sea­ horses in medicine shops and in souvenir stalls, and I was constantly receiving letters from aquarists plead­ ing for advice on how to keep their pet My own commitment to se�horses environment. Pregnancy lasts ten d�ys to six weeks, depending on the �pec1es seahorses alive. Nobody knew the scale began in 1986, when I was domg my or impact of the trade, and few peop!e PhD on their behaviour and ecology. I and water temperature, after which the male goes into labour. He pumps and knew much about seahorses. Thus, 111 was fascinated by seahorses, both for 1993 I set off to wander through Asia their own sake and for the possibility thrusts for hours to free the five to with '1ocal interpreters, asking questions they offered to answer general 1,500 young (again dependin_g largely questions about sex role reversal and on species). They then swim away, of everybody we met. The story began the evolution of sex differences. You never to return to dear old dad. to unfurl as we visited fishing villages, see only the male seahorse becomes Most seahorse species are faithful to dried fish traders, shell-craft exporters, pregnant (see Nature Aust.* Spring one site and to one partner. This :fidelity aquarium dealers, and traditional 1989). The female transfers eggs to the has been best studied in the Australian medicine practitioners. Fisheries male's brood pouch, where they are species Hippocampus whitei. Each male managers and government officials fertilised. The father then protects the has his own patch of seagrass, often were often sceptical or dismissive, but developing embryos, provides oxygen only one square metre, where he by 1995 I had my unhappy answer. and nutrition, and controls the pouch spends all his time, pregnant for about

HE TRADE l SEAHORSE WAS HUGE Tand growing. It was very difficult to SEAHORSES be certain of its absolute volume because the few published data that Classification existed were full of gaps and dis­ All classified as one genus (Hippocampus) in the family Syngnathidae, which also crepancies, and much of the field includes pipefishes and seadragons. Taxonomy in disarray, and under revision, but information I could glean was anecdotal probably about 35 species. Australia probably has more seahorse species (at least 11) and circumstantial. But from inter­ than any other country. viewing many people on different trade levels in many countries, I estimated Distribution and Habitat that at least 20 million seahorses were Found in most temperate and tropical seas, from Korea and Canada to Tasmania and sold dried for medicines and curios in Uruguay. Live in seagrasses, mangroves, coral reefs and estuaries. Commonly in depths 1995 with hundreds of thousands more of only a few metres. Usually seen grasping something with their tail. sold 'iive for aquariums. Assurance that Reproduction this estimate is not too high comes from Taiwan's Customs data, which recorded Only the male becomes pregnant, providing protection, oxygen, nourishment and net imports of about 11.3 tonnes of environmental regulation to developing young. Pregnancy lasts about 10 days to 6 weeks, seahorses (more than three million depending on species and water temperature, after which the male goes into labour to animals) per year for that island alone in release young. Produce 5 to 1,500 young per pregnancy, depending largely on adult size 1993 and 1994. Indeed, one Singapore and latitude. Most species appear to form faithful long-term pairs. Male and female merchant laughed at my underestimat�, partners meet every morning to dance together. A widowed animal takes a while to repair. pointing out that it would be exceeded if Movement Patterns even two per cent of mainland Chinese Most are diurnal. used one seahorse annually. Many species have very small home ranges. Males, for example, may move only within 2 China's enormous economic growth 1 m for months during the breeding season, although females usually roam more. Short seasonal migrations are suspected for some species. is the key to the sudden increase in demand for seahorses and other Diet medicinal products. These fishes hai ma) ed as Voracious ambush predators that rely on immobility and camouflage to (known as are perceiv catch just arteri about any live animal small enough to fit into their snouts (e.g. zooplankton, important for curing asthma, ?­ crustaceans, fishes). sclerosis, impotence, incontinence, slon ailments and a host of other maladies. As disposable income grows, so *Previously ANH 58 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN !998 - rses has increased demand for seaho by least eight to ten per. cent _annually, at 111 Ch111a. ccording to 1�1erchants_ Very y (or riigh retail pnces (particularl the ·eferred large, smooth, bleached ��ahorses) only add t? their allure_ in societies whe!·e consp1cu?us spend111g is valued, particularly for gifts. Traders in Hong Kong have commented that de1_nand for seahors�s is limitless. S:erta1!1ly merchants 111 China complam�d 111 1995 tl�at they could not obtam enough dned sea­ horses, and asked us to arrange supplies of hundreds o_f thousands of extra animals. The mam sources are apparently the ?hilippi�es, Thailand, Vietnam and India. Yet virtually all the fisherswe interviewed in Asia told tales

As I travelled the world, I kept encountering piles of dead seahorses in medicine shops and souvenir stalls.

of recent dramatic decreases in se ahorse numbers in their local populations, citing 25 to 50 per cent drops over five years or even 70 per cent losses over ten years in the central Philippines. Traditional Chinese medicine traders welcome the recent increase in sales of pre-packaged patent medicines because consumers cannot tell when these include the less preferred, damaged and juvenile seahorses that would be rejected if sold whole. Indonesia's traditional Jamu medicine also uses seahorses, both whole and pre-packaged. As Asian seahorse numbers decline, Chinese merchants seek supplies elsewhere, even as far afield as Nigeria and Mozambique, Ecuador and Hon­ duras. The main consumers are China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, Singapore and Korea, but ethnic Chinese in Western countries such as Australia als o rely on dried seahorses. North America and Europe provide the main markets for live seahorses and for curios, with one Philippines company reportedly exporting at least 90,000 dned seahorses to Italy in one year. The S �ahorses of several species hanging in pairs (lied back >- -to-back at neck and tail) outside a 15 u curio or souvenir shop in Vietnam. Starfish, z lob > sters, shell-craft, and dried fish products

USA both buys �nd sells seahorses, with Florida landmg at least 112,000 seahorses in 1994. There are hints that Australia too is involved in the seahorse trade, with ertisements for dried seahorses adv r appearing f equently in a fisheriestrade journal for several years, and with one Tasmanian-based commodities comp­ an y requesting 500 kilograms of dried seahorses from the Institute of Ocean­ ography in Vietnam. Moreover, Austral­ ian trade in pipefishes,which are in the same family as seahorses, is well documented. The largest pipefishes (Solegnathus spp.) are often called seadragons (hai

here are hints that Australia too is involved in the seahorse trade, with advertisements for dried seahorses appearing frequently in a fisheries trade journal.

long) in traditional Chinese medicine and are at least as valuable as seahorses. The stunning fishes that Australians call seadragons (Phyllop­ teryx taeniolatus and Phycodurus eques) are not used medicinally. Traders throughout Asia report purchases of Solegnathus pipefishes from Australia (al�o known as pipehorses, because of their curled finlesstail similar to that of seahorses), and Taiwan's Customs data s�ow imports of more than 1,000 ½ilograms from Australia in 1995. The little we know suggests that these are mostly a by-catch of trawling off Queens­ land, of little economic importance to excellent camouflage and the seahorses A male Hippocampus breviceps gives birth. the fisher. Recently, however, some facilitate capture by just gripping their fisher precludes reproduction by the other s_ �ave been asking Queensland holdfasts ever more tightly, rather than a�thonties to consider recognising the fleeing. until it forms a new pair bond, which pipefish by-catch as a market commod­ Our earlier work on Australian and commonly takes weeks; and their slow (ty, su_ggesting its value may be other species suggests that seahorses swimming and small home ranges mcreasmg. We really do need studies to have many traits that make them prevent them from moving rapidly into u�derstand the impact of trawling on particularly vulnerable to heavy fishing areas where seahorses have been fished pipehorse populations and to consider pressure. Brood carrying (pregnancy) down. In addition, adults are not usually ways to ensure their numbers are not means that the young will die if the adult exposed to heavy predation so they have reduced, perhaps by altering fishing dies, which is not the case in species not adapted to the heavy adult mortality gea� or establishing strategically placed without parental care and not imposed by fishing. Exploitation of f manne reserves. necessarily the case in species that temperate species, such as those in So�e seahorses are also a by-catch of merely guard a brood; lengthy parental southern Australia, could be particularly trawling but in developing countries care and small brood size (other fishes serious as they have longer pregnancies man and shorter reproductive seasons in � are specifically sought by may produce hundreds of thousands to r subsistence fishers who catch them millions of young at a time) mean that which to recover f om exploitation. one ' ' All in all, it's easy to realise that bY one. An_ experienced seahorse seahorses can t rapidly replenish fisher finds 1t easy to penetrate their depleted populations, no matter how conservation measures are needed to favourable the conditions are for stabilise and restore wild seahorse A 'no · · n-pregnant' H"1ppocamp us abdomina/1s juvenile survival; their long-term fidelity populations, although these are not so male seahorse holding on with his tail. means that catching one partner easy to accomplish. Seahorses are now NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 61 populations. This means adjusting both supply and demand.

UR FIRST SEAIIORSE_ CONS�RYA­ 111 Otion project is based tl�� v1\lage of Handumon in the c�nt�·al Ph1l�pp111es. This area is known for its 111n_ovat1ve fish­ ers and is largely resp?ns1ble for the spread of seahorse _fishmg around the country. About one-fifth of the house holds in Handumon depend on seahor�­ es commonly for 40 per cent of their an'nual cash income. Fisher� catch �ea­ horses by hand, at nig�t, while spearing other fish for the family food. So many other marine resources have alrea�y collapsed that this extre�nely poor vil­ lage cannot imagine how 1t will comp�n­ sate for the current tremendous declme

We believe the best way to reduce exploitation of wild seahorses is by providing poor seahorse fishers with an alternative to the very hard work of seahorse fishing.

in seahorse numbers. There is, there­ fore, widespread support for the �om­ munity-based initiatives that I d1r�ct with a team of biologists and social workers from the Haribon Foundation, a Filipino conservation organisation_. The Handumon village council has now set aside a 33-hectare marine reserve in good (but damaged) seahorse habitat, where fishing for all species is banned, and also enforces laws against illegal fishing in the r�st of the village waters. Fishers, counc1llors _ and other villagers patrol and morntor their waters caref-ully with the result that within 18 months the number of fish species, and the numbers and sizes of fishes in the reserve have all increased. Moreover, fishing around the reserve has improved noticeably, thus One of the seahorse culturing ponds at the providing hope to local people �nd contributing a vital portion of the annual encouraging other villages to establish Institute of Oceanography, Nha Trang, income of many of the world's poorest Vietnam. Vietnamese biologist Do Huu Hoang their own marine reserves. fishers, and are considered an Fishers desperately need the money examines some of the seahorses he has reared important staple for several types of r since their birth in captivity. Skills are now that come f om catching the large traditional medicine. I worried a lot pregnant males and juvenile seahorses, being transferred to the local fishers to about how to reconcile the needs of replace capture of wild seahorses. otherwise best left in the sea, so we animals and the needs of people before have developed a partial conservation realising that the goals were the same: solution. Fishers place newly caught more seahorses. We must ensure pregnant males in sea cages, leaving sufficient seahorses in the wild so that them there until the young are born, some can be fished without jeopardising whereupon the young escape to the reef 62 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN J99B -

r a e ale is sold. Simila ly, �nde1: response carefully.* Further and th m r Reading a e eshly caught Juvemle Seahorse e s s ar s ne ·niti tiv f numb r in ome p t of Vincent, A.CJ., 1996. The internationaltrade in seahors­ � � ses ar now held \n five-meb·e­ the world re se e e e es. s 1 r � a v rely d plet d but TRAFFIC International: Cambridge, UK. �� corrals in the sea, built and run by these fishes are probably not yet on the h s ho s s �'.o�ps of _fishers, until t e ea 1: e brink of extinction. With a lot of luck Vincent, A.C.J. & Sadler, L.M., 1995. Faithful pair bonds in s e a The �eaho s s and har o a s o wild seahorses, Hippocampus whitei. Anim. Behav. 50: �ouble in iz nd value_. 1_ e d w rk, nd public upp rt, we e his od, a e a e o e e e h 1557-1569 start to reproduc du!·111g _ t pen m y b bl t turn th tid noug to o es to the sea. In ensure tha s ah rs s r e 'th their y ung cap111g t e o e male can g e t Vincent, Natl o s so h h r s A.CJ., 1994. The improbable seahorse. projects we a dvance l an _t at t ei partner and produce t heir young Geog. 186(4): 126-140. r�tll s s o fishers c an pay t hem elve up-fl nt, for many generations to come.• h o he hey repaying t e m ney w n t Vincent, A.C.J. & Pajaro, M.G., in press. Community s ho e *As of 1 January 1998, all seahorses, eventually sell the ea rs �: B�cau�e based management for a sustainable seahorse fishery. s se pipefishes and seadragons became subject Proceedings of the 2nd World Fisheries Congress, conservation pr�ble�1 don t a, 1 . 111 to soi Australia's Brisbane, 1996. isolation, the proJect IS � deve1 �p111g Wildlife Protection Act. Any exports of s e ative livelihood opt10n , 1ynn111� a these fishes now require permits, which are only alt rn 11 Dr Amanda Vincent is Assistant Professor in e a o o ra ns 1ncl � g granted/or animals derived from captive breeding range of duc ti n p� g i: Conservation Biology at McGill University, e s h o � 1 conservation appr nbce 1PS .f r 11� - programs or from approved management plans. Montreal, Canada. She leads work on the ro se school children, and y mot111g wi This could be very good news for seahorses, reproductive ecology, trade, conservation so r es management of all manne re u � . provided the Australian Government administers and management of seahorses, pipefishes Similar holistic approa�hes . dnve my these controls well, p_romotes necessary research and pegasid fishes. Seahorses are both her other main field proJect, 111 V,e�am. A on wild populations, and ensures that manage­ passion and her excuse for involvement in team of biologists from the Institute of ment initiatives support conservation goals. many related marine conservation issues. Oceanography m onitors the_ seahorse lrnde and studies seahorse _b1olog_y, but concentrates on develop111g village­ based aquaculture techniques for seahors es. We believe �e best way �o reduce exploitation of wild seahorses_ 1s by providing poor seahorse fishers with an alternative to the v ery hard work of seahorse fishing-seahorse aqua­ culture, for example. The process is _far from perfected but we are getting closer. Australian companies a re also em­ barking on seahorse aquaculture. How­ ever limitless demand for seahorses mea�s that aquaculture in developed countries such as Australia is likely to be merely an economic activity, with \ little or no conservation b enefit. It could even be damaging. First, problems with diet and disease currently hamper most attempts at seahorse aquaculture, such that they keep having to catch wild seahorses to renew their broodstock. Second, any growth in seahorse aquaculture is more likely to make legislative protection difficult if that becomes advisable. Australi a can be a potential buffer against extinction of at least some Indo­ Pacific seahorse species. Seahorses can be caught legally in most places in the world. Few countries in the r egion could control the very diffuse and lucrative trade in seahorses even if laws were implemented. Australia is a rare exception: this country has the legal and legislative power to regulate fishing and to protect species, and Australian fi�hers do not depend on seahorses a nd p1pefishes for their livelihoods. Indeed, 1 Tasmania already has laws protecting seahorses and pipefishes, although permits have been granted to collect aquaculture broodstock. There is no doubt that pressure on Australian seahorses will increase as Asian I seaho a s a h rse popul tion decline, nd t at Australia will need to consider its

A female Hippocampus breviceps transfers her eggs to the male.

NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 p H O T O A R T

Yellow-banded Dart (Ocybadistes walkeri sothis) by M. Coupar

Mountain Spotted Skipper (Oreisplanus perornatus) by John P. Cooper

64 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN !998 -· Red Lacewing (Cethosia cydippe) by Tom & Pam Gardener

FLUTTER-BYS IMAGES FROM THE NATURE FOCUS PHOTO LIBRARY

k

NATURE AU STRALIA AUTUMN 1998 65 p H O T O A R T

A moth (Agathia prasinaspis) by H. & J. Beste

66 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 I Common Brown Ringlet (Hypocysta metirius) by Pavel German

I.

Orange Lacewing (Cethosia penthesilea) by Pavel German

67 NATU RE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 Green Spotted Triangle Butterfly (Graphium agamemnon) by Pavel German

Common Silver Xenica (Oreixenica lathoniella) by John P. Cooper

68 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN !998 p H O T O A R T

\

pomona) by H. & J. Beste Lemon Migrant (Catopsilia

69

NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 - against and il struck straig�t at my face, its closed mouth hke a fist to VIEWS FROM THE FOURTH DIMENSION using whack me between the eyes. I was flung across the room and knocked out cold. of over Wlien I came to, the cranky reptile had Reticulated Pythons are known to reach lengths his more of an hors my terrified friend cl�win� way up ten metres-at which size adult humans become the kitchen counter whtle his mother was d'oeuvre than a main meal. trying, successfully, to _drop the sack over its head from behmd. Ah, sweet memories of childhood. Although Australia doesn't have Boa Constrictors, it does have their close rel­ FRIED AND atives, the pythons. Of these, the Amethystine Python (Morelia amethisti­ na) has been recorded at lengths of eight FOOTLESS FOSSIL metres. Australia's largest snake, howev­ er, may be an unnamed fossil python FANGERS from the four-million-year-old Bluff Downs fauna! assemblage of north-ea t­ BY MICHAEL ARCHER ern Queensland. Brian Mackness and John Scanlon (University of New South Wales) suggest that this king squeeze of the Pliocene could have been, like Reticulated Pythons, over ten metres Museum. From the tip of its tail to its for­ long. midably long, curved, needle-sharp teeth John, whose doctoral thesis focused on (which had fanged one of the prepara­ the diversity and evolution of Australia's tors), it measured a little under four snakes, has been describing new kinds metres long. Reticulated Pythons not from the World Heritage fossil deposits much longer than this are capable of of Riversleigh. Included are Australia' making a meal of teenage-size humans. first extinct blind burrowing snakes HERE IS A SMALL RESTAURANT Like several of the world's living pythons, (family Typhlopidae). Although these in Kuching on the island Reticulated Pythons are known to reach worm-size wrigglers are only nightmares Tof Borneo where for a price anything lengths of over ten metres-at which size of the insects' world, one tiny Indian remotely edible from scorpions to mon­ adult humans become more of an hors species evidently crawls inside the ears keys can be added to the day's menu. d'oeuvre than a main meal. At this length, of people who sleep on the ground! Because the proprietress did a roaring these predatory sacks of muscle are near Australia's, and possibly the world's, trade in the finest fried all-python meat the maximum size for any snake, living oldest elapids (family Elapidae) also patties, a highly coveted local delicacy, or extinct. come from Riversleigh. This widespread we hoped to purchase the skeletal rem­ Snakes big and small first wound their and diverse family includes toxic taxa nants of a large Reticulated Python way around my own heart when, as an ranging from Afro-Asian cobras and (Python reticulatus) to compare with fos­ eight-year-old, I was emotionally dis­ kraits to Australia's browns and the sil pythons that looped through the membered by a Grimm's Fairy Tale Fierce Snake (Oxyuranus microlepido­ Tertiary limestones of Riversleigh. An about a tiny snake that befriended an tus)-far and away the most poisonous reptile in the world. One Australian branch of elapids even gave rise to ven­ omous sea snakes (hydrophiids and lati­ Although these worm-size wrigglers are only nightmares of caudids). Although it is possible that elapids evolved in Australia, it seems more likely that they entered Australia the insects' world, one tiny Indian species evidently crawls from the north not long before their first rare appearances in Riversleigh's early inside the ears of people who sleep on the ground! Miocene (25-million-year-old) rocks. Pythons (family Pythonidae) occur throughout Riversleigh's 25-million-year sequence of rocks. Small ones are almost over-stuffed Reticulated Python wound innocent always present in bat-rich cave deposits child. Every day it came to the like Gotham City Site, suggesting con­ its lumpy way around the ceiling of the back step where the child would give it a siderable antiquity for the python pas­ dining room, shedding little showers of saucer of milk-until a horrid sawdust old woman time of plucking bats out of thin air. on the tables below. After we who liv�d in the house killed pointed to the python, it with a Large ones are also common, including the proprietress broom m front of the child. That led us to a toilet behind r was it­ 'Montypythonoides' (now Morelia) river­ the kitchen. The f o�n the age of eight, snakes and floor was covered with I wer� sleighensis which may have been over five hessian bags an m_sepa�able item. The only dent seething with snakes of all kinds in the metres long, and an unnamed form that and rela�10n�h1p occurred when I was sizes. She pointed out a pile of pythons 15. resembled the Reticulated Python. Havmg Just �ken delivery of a two-metre destined for the pot and told us to help Bo� Far more mysterious are the extinct Constnctor_ (Boa_ constrictor), I ause ourselves. After settling on a price, we �c1d d to offer madtsoiids (family Madtsoiidae). Bec � � 1t a dnnk of water at a these s have swung the largest bag, snake unseen fnend s h?use. I remember massive, primitive snake int? the boot well the rush been found in America, of the taxi waiting outside: of adrenalm when the unexpectedly Australia South trymg to ignore the horrified large A�rica and Madagascar,' must ave driver's head emerged from that hes they � protests. ian sack­ slithered throughout the once-united and that was the last thing I remem­ Later that day I saw the snake on the berec lands of Gondwana. The largest was L By holding the sack, I gave the Madtsoi b t preparation table of the Sarawak powerful snake something a ai from the Paleocene (abou to push 60 million , esti- 70 year ago) of Argentina NATU RE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN !998 Australia's Wonambi naracoortensis was the last survivor of a mysterious group of Gondwanan giants. mated to have also been ten metres in length. John _Scanlon reported Nano­ wa11agodthelp1, a small (abo�� one metre r long) and very odd n�adtsond f om 20- million-year-old deposits at Riversle1gh_ _ whose teeth were hinged so they could fold backwards. Some large madtsoiids, John suggests, may have be�n aq!-latic, staring up at kangaroos which dipped their faces into pools to drink-for the last time. Although madtsoiids vanished else­ where just over 50 million years ago, in Ausli-alia they survived until the end of the Pleistocene (perhaps 100,000 years ago). Two partial skeletons of Wonambi naracoortensis, one of Australia's largest madtsoiids, were recovered from Henschke's Cave in south-eastern South Australia by local fossil enthusiast John Barrie. Although only six metres long, this sumo of the slitherers may have weighed in at 250 kilograms. How snakes this size, which normally require warm climates, survived in southern Australia is a mystery. Until recently most evolutionists pre­ sumed that the first snakes evolved on land, from some unknown group of leg­ less lizards. However research by Michael Caldwell (University of Alberta) and Michael Lee (University of Sydney) of Pachyrachis problematicus, an early Cretaceous (97-million-year-old) marine reptile from Israel, reveals it to be a per­ fect 'missing link' between the extinct mosasauroid lizards (which included ten­ metre-long marine horrors) and the oth­ erwise most primitive known snakes. Its sn�ke-like, metre-long body was well­ suited for swimming, despite its distinct but small hind limbs. If, as Caldwell and Lee conclude, the first snakes evolved and lived in the sea, the Father of all ser­ pents who sweet-talked Eve must have worked his wicked wiles from a branch of coral in the Ocean of Eden.•

Further Reading Caldwell, M. & Lee, M., 1997. A snake with legs from the marine Cretaceous of the Middle East. Nature 386: 705-709.

Barrie, D.J., 1990. Skull elements and associated remains of the Pleistocene boid snake Wonambi nara­ coot1ensis.Mem. Qld Mus. 28: 139-151. We offer only three dry season light-pack trips Scanlon, J., 1997. Nanowana gen. nov., small madtsoi­ in Kakadu, two in the id snakes from the Miocene of Riversleigh: sympatric Kimberley and two else· species with divergently specialised dentition. Mem. Qld where in the Top End. M us. 41: 393-412. Don't miss out. Ask for our new brochure. Shine, R., 1991. Australian snakes: a natural history. Reed Books: Sydne y. Willis's Walkabouts Professor Michael Archer lectures in biology 1 2 Carrington St Millner NT 081 0 f{},_d geology at the University of New South ales. Most of his non-teaching hours are Phone: (08) 8985 2134 Fax: (08) 8985 2355 %evoted_ _to the study of the fossil faunas of iverslezgh, north-western Queensland. 71 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 REVIEWS

the largest snake species, � The main sections of the urns with minerals and g�m­ stone displays and expertise, both venomous and non-ven­ book follow. There is an omous, and several appen­ alphabetical list of gemstones so that people can get to see _ and know more about what dices of relevant statistics with localities, where possi­ (classification, sizes, speeds ble, in all States. These are �hey are actually looking for. _ and reproduction). The not given precisely so it It should be possible to rec­ tify these fairly glaring faults answers are liberally illustrat­ would be necessary to seek _ out more detail from other for the next presentation, ed with drawings and clear source . Next is a State-by­ thus providing a tighter, black-and-white photographs, State rundown on the main more informative guidebook. with a centre section of fossicking areas and occur­ However, these qualifica­ colour plates. rences, with some maps and tions aside, if you have -Glen Shea ' information on access and always intended to take the University of Sydney accommodation. family fossicking or are plan­ Poor quality of both black­ ning to go on a field trip with The Grn/1w11 Pizzr.y & Frnnlz K11igl11 and-white and colour photos, friends this is a good, com­ plus the absence of any size pact little introductory guide FIELD,�,GUID E scale, diminish the useful­ to whet your appetite. BIRDS of AUSTRALIA ness of the guide. Some -Gayle Webb A Fossicker's colour plates are inappropri­ Australian Museum Guide to ate and have been wasted on Gemstones in items such as a white fossil crab, white gypsum crystals Australia _ By Nance and Ron Perry. Reed and an ironstone concretion, Books, Vic., 1997, 160pp. which are not gemstones and $24.95rrp. did not need colour treat- ment. There are no illustra­ Fossicking is an activity tions of diamond crystals, that many people long to try and yet "Is this a diamond their hand at and this is a crystal?" is a common Aust­ helpful little guide for begin­ ralian Museum public ners. The Perrys have writ­ inquiry. Minerals such as ten several books on the sub­ crocoite and azurite/mala­ ject and this latest paperback chite are of interest to miner­ edition was originally pub­ al collectors but are not gem­ lished as A prospector's guide stones. Six of the 23 colour to gemstones (1982). plates are agate, when two The Graham The book starts from would have been enough. Pizzey & Frank scratch, with a definition of Colour plates of the more Knight Field fossicking, and gives basic commonly sought gems Guide to the Birds information for the beginner would have been much more Snakes in of Australia about climate, maps, geology, helpful to beginners. There Question By Graham Pizzeyand Frank gemology and equipment. are no colour plates of blue or By C.H. Ernst and C.R. lung. Knight. HarperCollins, NSW, 1997, Important matters such as zoned sapphire crystals, gar­ CS/RO Publishing, Vic., 1997, 576pp. $35.00rrp. legalities, etiquette and safety net crystals, blue topaz, 220pp. $29.95rrp. are touched upon. Ways of green beryl or peric;lot. Austi·alia has the luxury of collecting and working The section headed "Fur­ Snakes in question is one of three high-quality guides to deposits are explained in sim­ ther Reading" could be a series originally produced bird identification. As these ple terms, for people with no much improved. Apart from by the Smithsonian Insti­ have evolved over the past prior experience. various government publica­ tution aiming to answer the two decades, each has gar­ How does one recognise a tions, which can be difficult most commonly asked ques­ nered its own set of propon­ gemstone in the field? The to obtain, there is no book tions about certain types of ents. Graham Pizzey's origi­ Perrys provide a list of gems listed with a publication date animals. Snakes have always nal guide, published in 1980, and their appearances that, later than 1982. More recent been objects of fascination to has now been completely although intended to be help­ books on gemology and gem­ humans, and the vast folklore redone, with only a partial ful, is sometimes couched in stones include Gemstones of that has built up around them the southern continents resemblance between it and such vague terms that they warrants a book like this in the new version. The scale would be little help in an (1991) by Lin Sutherland of reply. The majority of the of the changes, completely identification. The descrip­ the Australian Museum. book consists of clear, simple tion of diamond as "small rewritten and with brand new Another section entitled answers lo 90 commonly illustrations, is that of a new crystals; oily appearance", for "Helpful Information" gives a asked questions about snakes, book rather than revision. In example, makes no mention number of addresses to con­ grouped into four broad the new guide, the biggest of the unique lustre of dia­ tact for more information, but themes, together with a sec­ mond or its crystal shape. could have mentioned muse- shortcoming of its predeces­ tion describing the biology of sor has been addressed while

72 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 s�rengths. maintaining the . intere l ed1t1on had an ted in. The origina Now, and out-of-date for­ . lo the greatest criti­ unwieldy cism of the book. It which placed the text, seems not mat, to have been revised very illustrations and maps as sep­ well. The most recent refer­ arate sections. In the new ence been in the bibliography is version this has recti­ 1986 and all the relevant there is none of the fied with recent RA, GE OF PREIIISTORIC on a species works on, for example, A IMALS info;·mation eucalypts FROM $6.95 facing pages. and cycads. Some available on of the habitat Check 011r 1 edition of this work and distribution 11 eb si1e for/i1r1her The first information in de1ails 011 di11osauria. ed by far the most the texts is contain incorrect, for example, for extensive species accounts of Angophora hispida, Shefflera, LISTEN ... the three guides. Although etc. ha OUR the level of detail been Despite its faults, LAND IS CR.YI this this book trimmed somewhat, Australian should be very useful the most in­ Flora for a book still offers By Leonard Cronin. �1ature lover just starting information on individ­ Reed Books _ to depth Vic., 1997, 320pp. $45.00rrp. 1dent1fy Australia's flora and I ual species. hope that another edition The illustrations are the better revised, will appea; most important component of This is a well-presented soon after this one sells out. any field guide and in this book, lavishly and beautifully -Don F. Blaxell 1\lnrm.:.Al.lA'S J!(S.Vll!Oi�J\11:Nr; VR�JJJJ'�''s.&Sounr2!!,!;;:..,-: _ guide they succeed admir­ illustrated by four talented Royal Botanic Gardens Kni0·ht has pro­ artists. ably. Frank I could find the names Sydney MA���HJ'.r,h-·_� duced plates that are attrac­ of only two of the artists tive without compromising Roslyn Devaux and Mario� LISTEN OUR LA D'S CRYING their usefulness. The number Westmacott, on the illustra­ The speclre of'desenifica1io11 lurks bel1i11d rnrren/ land 11se prac1ices i11 of species on a plate is gener­ tions (with the majority by ••J f I ally fewer than in the other the latter artist), so I assume LISTEN. arid lands i11c/11di11g A11s1ralia. field guides and the individ­ that the unnamed plates are OUR LAND IS CRYI, $59.95 ual figures are larger. It also by the other two. The work gives space to show different was first published in 1989 as plumages without overcrowd­ Concise Australian flora and ing. The only real criticisms this edition is stated to have are occasional problems with been revised. More on that proportion and shape. later. There are a few errors, The format is designed so such as some maps with that native plants, from markedly erroneous distribu­ whichever part of Australia, tions, but no doubt these will are grouped under the broad be rectified in subsequent categories of "Wildflowers", - 1\tJ;;1JR_AL,IA'fE&'VTR()�},!!, ,t!,T>� ::_ - _c: i EUPMOL S BEETLE editions. The cover and bind­ "Trees", "Palms", "Cycads 'PROBLEMS /li SOEUTIONS . - - • --, (WEEVIL) KEYRING ing are made to withstand and Pandanus", "Ferns" and Ac11wl speci111e11 in resin use in the field and maintain "Fungi". It is good to see this -A greal gifi! their integrity, definite pluses last group included in such a $6.95 for a book intended as a book, even though recent working tool. Overall the research indicates that fungi Listen ... Our Land standard of production is are not plants. The inclusion is Crying. high. of a few of the more common Australia's The major complaint to mosses, liverworts and Environment: make about this book is its lichens would have been use­ Problems and size. At 24 x 15.5 centimetres ful. Solutions and 1.1 kilograms, it is Keys are included under By Mary E. White. Simon & markedly larger and heavier each of those major headings Schuster, NSW, 1997, 296pp. than its competitors. This and they work well with some $59.95rrp. can be a significant disadvan­ species. However the deci­ tage for a book intended to be sion by the author to classify This is Mary White's third carried in the major ground-breaking book, field. Some some of the common species The people may find the inconven or 'Wildflower" is the other two being ­ as 'Tree" Gondwana i�nce of transporting it suffi­ not very consistent. For greening of and The browning of Gondwana. cient to relegate it to the role example, Acacia regens, "a WILD RELATIO 'S of a desk reference rather shrub to 4 metres" is includ­ Again it is a superb-looking A11 w11a:i11g a11d 1lto11glt1 than a field guide. This both­ ed in 'Wildflowers", whereas work, beautifully designed provoking series exploring 1lte ersome quibble aside Acacia longifolia, "a bushy and illustrated predominantly rlteJ11es of co11J7ic1 and Gr�ham Pizzey and Frank or small tree, 2-10 with her own colour photos. coopem1io11 w11011gs1 shrub set foot Knight have made an impo is included in Ever since humans A1wralia11 a11i111als. r­ metres" have tant contribution to the pract Other similar exam- on this continent they $29.95 i­ 'Trees". environ­ cal _ literature of Australian ples occur. . been affecting the orni . that over millions of thology. This book will The selection of species 1s ment Get them all from: certainly receive broad, and should years had reached an equilib­ a well­ good and were deserved audience. assist the user in at least get­ rium. Early changes in many instances a J\l .SI H\I.I" -Walter E. Boles ting an idea of the genus or slow and new equilibrium was reached. l\hs1l l\l S11rn• Australian Museum family of the plants they are 6 COi 11t:1 S1 Svu:,a., NSW 2000 NAT URE AUSTRALIA Fix: (02) 9320 @M AUTUMN 1998 1'110"'1 . (()2) 9320 6150 I \\I ll!«illl-,; \\ \\\\ \( Sl\\lS (,0\,\l bn descriptive notes with w Frog Call Series (three cas­ hat That is essentially how it was aware of the problems. you've found. This is aided by settes) and Voices of when Europeans arrived just This book, along with Tim the various colour-coded The future eaters, Subtropical Rainforests (CD). sec­ over 200 years ago. Armed Flannery's green for frog The first two form a set with a tions: s (of with their technology for should be essential reading course), blue for lizards broad coverage of the birds of growing crops, clearing land for all politicians and indeed for snakes and north-eastern Queensland brown turtle� for grazing and the need for all Australians. The problems (often referred to as tortois­ of such impor­ and the neighbouring Great extractive industries, they outlined are 61 es). future survival of Barrier Reef (63 and began to change the environ­ tance to the a The descriptions are bro­ we need to seri­ species respectively), with ment far loo fast for any new Australia that of the ken up into length (in cen­ to be established ously start working towards high percentage equilibrium species. The third ti!"11elres), colour (including downhill slide of solving the problem of degra­ endemic and the fers 61 species differences between sexes of our natural dation of the environment cassette of degradation vicinity of and juveniles), features such as soil and without delay. from the resourcesr that may aid in identi great deal of research has Lamington National Park in (those fi­ f eshwater began. A cation), reproduction (such obviously gone into the book the Border Ranges, including This accelerated and as whether reptiles produce many years and from the photos it is obvi­ a number of the endangered reached lhe point eggs or live young), simil ago where some people ous that the author experi­ forms. The explanatory ar give the species (those with which it began to recognise that the enced many of the document­ notes on the covers could not sus­ ed problem sites first hand, species name, duration of the could be confused and how to environment distinguish them), tain this abuse. In her book extending right across the track and a brief description status Mary brings all the problems continent. The quality of the of the vocalisation (but no (how common or rare it is) to our attention again, but production cannot be faulted locality information). These and then a section of biologi'. with renewed urgency for as has always been the hall­ new productions maintain the ea! notes including distribu­ solutions to be applied or mark of White's books. The high standards that Stewart tion, diet, call (in the case of found before our greed leads book is easily worth the has set in his earlier record­ frogs) and habitat. us to a point of no return. $59.95 price, which has been ings and are warmly recom­ The book also contains an Of the 15 chapters, 13 are kept to an affordable level by mended. informative introduction (en­ devoted to various problems a grant from Fuji Xerox -Walter E. Boles hanced by more colour pho­ brought about by the activi­ Australia. Australian Museum tographs) on the habitats ties of humans. The extent of -Robert Jones identification methods, obser'. the problem is detailed and Australian Museum vation techniques, and a time­ examples of solutions that ly section on declining have succeeded in overcom­ Australian Bird Sounds species and possible causes ing the problem are docu­ Queensland's including a detailed list of mented. It becomes all too Wet Tropics and those Sydney species in evident that the Australian Great Barrier Reef decline. It also has a good environment is not capable of The Larger, or Non Passerine Birds overview description of each remaining in a healthy state group (snakes, frogs etc.) at and supporting European­ the beginning of the section style farming, grazing and the dealing with them. The lan­ effects of feral animals. guage and terminology used Australia is different to is simple and easily under­ Europe and North America in stood throughout. many ways. It is the driest There are a couple of minor vegetated continent and prob­ niggles. The vocal sac of the lems related to water supply Red-eyed Tree Frog (page a d usage are � probably the 20) is referred to as a 'pouch'. biggest factors that will even­ While not necessarily wrong, tually, if they continue this could be misleading (per­ unchecked, lead to vast areas Oavicl Stewart's Nature Sound of land being laid to waste. , haps 'throat pouch' would T� some the book may give have been better?). The a frightening picture. Is it Mosquito Fish (page 17) is Australian Bird now known as Gambusia hol­ really as bad as White points Sounds Audio brooki C. a/finis, out? The reader may come not al­ Tapes though many books still refer away with a feeling of doom Queenland's Wet Tropics and and gloom and helplessness to it as such. And the poten­ Great Barri�r Reef: The Larger, or Frogs and e pecially if you live in a big Non-Passenne tially very important last page � Birds Reptiles of the on treating and preventing city and feel that you have lit­ Queenland's Wet Tropics and tle influence over Sydney Region snake bite is separated from what hap­ Great Barrier Reef: The Smaller By Ken Griffiths. pens in the bush where UNSW Press the rest of the text by two the or Passerine Birds NSW, 1997, 128pp. majority of these problems amington $19.95/rp. blank pages-it should really � National Park: be ce. seem to exist. But big cities Rainforests of the Subtropics. given more prominen But minor and urbanised areas have Produced by David Stewart, Nature �his is an excellent field all in all these are their problems too. It is only Sound (PO Box 256, Mullumbimby guide f_or bush walkers, field problems. naturalists, To sum up, Frogs and rep­ by being made aware of the NSW 2482), 1996, $15.00rrp and anyone who tiles. of the Sydney region problems confronting us that each. feels a curiosity for the reptile is a we have any chance of influ­ and amphibian fauna they very useful book, both sized encing may encounter (11 x 22 centimetres) and the politicians and Davie Stewart, even in their those ! one of Sydney backyards. priced nicely to make it in power to ensure that Australia's leading nature g vernments take It is easy t� use by flicking become a well-used regional Lzste? action. sound recordists, has added . 11;... Our land is crying through Griffiths' superb field guide. thes� cassettes of bird voices certamly makes photos to find a likely -Martyn Robinson the reader to his previous Australian match and then comparing the Australian Museum 74 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 SOCIETY PAGE Australia there l Get involved! Across is a network of active societies arge and small local and . tiona1 • which e 1st to fur her the cause of l . Whether your special interest is conservation, bird � n ;ks b �:. ' x t the subject that you ho d dear s, sci nce , ational pa , ushwa ng or a particu l i ar group of animals, there's a society for you.

WELFARE The Australian Bush ANIMAL TAMS, The Australian SCIENTIFIC known as Heritage Fund ANZFAS (also Museum Society RESEARCH ') GPO Box 'Animals Australia 101, 6 College SL, Australian Entomological 37 O'Connell St, Hobart, Tas. 7001 Sydney, NSW 2000 Society Inc. e, Vic. 3051 Ph: (03) 6223 2670 Nth Melbourn Ph: (02) 9320 6225 Department of Entomology, 6333 Conlacl: Doug Humann Ph: (03) 9329 Conlacl: Sandra Harrison University of Queensland, Qlcl Oogjes Contact: Glenys ••••• 4072 Donations welcome Membership Fee: $55.00 single; Ph: (07) 3365 1564 $30.00; Membership Fee: $70.00 household; $40.00 stu- Fax: (07) 3365 1922 $20.00 concession EARTH SCIENCES dent/pensioner Email: Dino Club NSW [email protected] BIRDS Australian Museum, The Waterhouse Club Contact: Dr David Waller Avicultural Society of SA Inc. 6 College St, SA Museum, PO Box 3234, ydney, NSW 2000 North Tee, Membership Fee: $55.00 Rundle Mall, Ph: (02) 9320 6223 Adelaide, SA 5000 Adelaide, SA 5001 Contact: Val Bower or Jenny Ph: (08) 8207 7389 ASSAB, Australasian Society Ph: (08) 8264 3295 Nancarrow Conlacl: Mr Mary Lou for the Study of Animal Contact: eroli and Bill Price Simp on Behaviour •••• Membership Fee: $12.00 • ••••• N W Agriculture, MembershipFee: $35.00 Membership Fee: $60.00 single; Agricultural Research Centre, EDUCATION $80. 00 family PMB 19, Eurobodalla Natural Science Teachers Trangie, NSW 2823 History Society Association of NT NATURAL HISTORY Ph: 68 88 7404 PO Box 123, PO Box 41809, Bairnsdale and District Field Contact: Bob Kilgour Moruya, SW 2537 Casuarina, NT 0811 Naturalists Club Inc. •• Ph: (02) 4471 2228 Ph: (089) 99 5295 PO Box 563, Membership Fee: $25.00 Aust. Contact: Eric Andrew Contact: Stephen Zander Bairnsdale, Vic. 3875 • •••• Ph: (03) 5156 2541 Earthwatch Australia Membership•• Fee: $15.00 Membership Fee: $75.00 Contact: Margaret Regan Level 1 453-457 Elizabeth St, individual; •••• Melbourne, Vic. 3000 Friends of the Helmeted $150.00 school/corporation Membership Fee: $12.00; $20.00 Ph: (03) 9600 9100 Honeyeater family Contact: Suzanne Knight PO Box 131, FROGS •• { Woori Yallock, Vic. 3139 Tablelands Frog Club Inc. NATURAL SCIENCES Membership Fee: $45.00 Ph: (03) 9761 8942 Mail Bag 71, Royal Society of SA Inc. Contact: Margot Craddock Yungaburra, Qld 4872 c/- SA Museum, Newsletter/Journal,• Monthly meeting, •• Ph: (070) 966 556 orth Tee, • Bi-monthly meeting, Annual Membership Fee: $10.00 Contact: Beryl Davidson Adelaide, SA 5000 meeting/conference,• Weekly meeting, ••• Ph: (08) 8303 4730 • Quarterly meeting,• Field outings/Tours, CONSERVATION Membership Fee: $15.00 family; Conlacl: Dr Ole Wiebkin • Conservation/Working programs, Friends of the Platypus $10.00 single • • Discounted Goods, Magazine, 1 c/- Australian Platypus Membership Fee: $35.00 • Social/Education Activities, • Nature Conservancy, MARINE Australia magazine, • Seminars PO Box 84, CONSERVATION REPTILES Whiltlesea, Vic. 3757 & EDUCATION Victorian Herpetological Ph: (03) 9716 1626 Marine Life Society of SA Society Inc. Contact: 16 Suspension St, Geoff Williams 120 Wakefield St, Are you a Club •••••• Adelaide, SA 5000 Ardeer, Vic. 3022 Membership Fee: $30.00 adult; Ph: (08) 8270 4463 Ph: (03) 9363 6841 Secretary? $4 5. 00 family; $20.00 full-time Contact: Mr F.P. Hall Contact: Brian Barnetl student •• NATURE AUSTRALIA's Associate Membership•••• •Fee: $25.00 p.a. Three Meetings per year Membership Fee: $27.00 Society Scheme is designed to Orangutan Fund (concessions available) A upwards (several optio11s) ustralia Inc. help your club or society with PO Box 407, MUSEUM Northbridge, WA Tasmanian Herpetological free publicity, funds and 6865 Dinosaur Club ACT Ph: (08) 9316 9501 Society E-mail: National Dinosaur Museum, member benefits. Call us on [email protected] 273 Wesl Tamar Rei, Co Barton Hwy, ntact: Helen Smith (02) 9320 6119 Gungahlin, ACT 2912 Riverside, Tas. 7250 • (03) 6327 2466 Membership Ph: (06) 230 2655 Ph: Fee: $15.00 student; Contact: Sue Woinarski for more details. $25-00 individual; $35.00 Contact: Jeff Death family; $50.00 sponsor; $100. 00 Membership••• Fee: $10.00 fellow Membership Fee: $20.00 group 75 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 ...... ___ ) (iATBIRD Sk-7 Birdwatching Workshop I ' A Bird Hide 2-3 May & 7-8 Nov, 1998 at Pacific Palms, near Forster NSW. :rj You'll find 'Catbird' half way between beautiful Bluey's Beach and the cape at Jorn Nature author Libby Buhrich j Seal Rocks on Austral1a·s Holiday Coast. and award winning Orn1tholog1st � Catbird 1s nestled into a sub-tropical Dr. Leighton Llewellyn 1n --1.r-J rainforest on the sandy shores of Smiths conJunct1on with Lake, Just a three hour drive north of Boomerang 4WD ' S/1 WELCOME Sydney. Tours on a two From the privacy of your stylish rJL__J day workshop '"::_.- - \ TO THE GUIDE, self-contained accommodation expect in this \ to see many of the 240 species 1n and exqu1s1te area :_. · J around rainforest, lake and sea. -�i//·,, NatureAustralia's 31/? hours 'ih , Including the Green Catbird, Regent ·1)1,1r I U\v \ ''i� I drive north of " ' lI _ � 3 marketplace. Bowerb1rd, Blue-faced Honeyeater and / ,' Sydney. I- Rose Robin. Over 240 species are to be Nature author Libby Buhnch i{ Over 100,000 observedin a diverse array of habitats welcomes you to join her B1rdwatch1ng 1n State Forest and National Parks Breakfast and Sunset & Sati'ly cruise on NatureAustralia abutting the lakes and beaches, beautiful Wallis Lake. including littoral and subtropical [j readers look to the For brochures and speci,es list rainforest, woodlands, heaths, please contact, wetlands and sand dunes. Activ1t1es guide for up-to-date Libby Buhrich will include Wallis Lake cruises and Phone & Fax (02)65 544168 information on information on the management of Little Tern and Pelican breeding travel destinations, islands 1n the lake and mist netting 1n :.(� areas of great species diversity.

.,f�-1i\·,J,,.. ,. and equipment, Gourmet meals provided. For course outline and more information (��;,!� ·�i;_·,--- 1 wilderness tours; contact - Libby Buhrich's Birdwatching Tours (02)65 544168 even" bed and -:�:s��f�(;y,�:1 breakfasts".

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Fax (02) 65 63-21 l 0 or write to Wa1t-A-Wh1le Environmental Tours Somerset Holiday Accommodation, Phone: (07) 40 33 1153 Fax: (07) 40 33 5999 PO Box 6647, Cairns 4870 Ned Beach Road, email: [email protected] web. http://www 11g.com.au/-cns01789/ Lord Howe Island 2898 Australia 77 hen replying to advertisements Nature Austra ,-,a w Readers please mention Your cocoon was Mixed Signals A• Several years ago we • made by the larva . by our (caterpillar) of the White­ Q • were persuaded stemmed Gum Moth youngest daughter to hand-rear a Chelepteryx collesi). wild baby Rabbit. It was a male Q ( These and it survived to become a larvae are large, reaching over ten centimetres in much-loved pet. Because we felt length, and feed on eucalypt he might be lonely, we gave him leaves. They are covered an elderly Guinea Pig for & company. They became firm with numerous short spines that are woven into the friends. Two years later, during cocoon wall by the larva as the last few hours of the Guinea protection against predators. Pig's life, the Rabbit attempted A The spines not only make it to mate with it frequently, never difficult for parasites to having displayed such an interest attack the pupa within, but before. We have witnessed the they also embed in the skin same behaviour in our Dogs. If of any animal touching the one of them is dying from an Cocoon of Danger cocoon. Be warned: don't age-related cause, the others in At the beginning of the touch these cocoons or you the small pack (male or female) .• year I noticed a cocoon may be pulling out the spines will attempt to ride it for what we hiddenQ among my honeysuckle for some time! The spines believe is the same reason. vine. The cocoon was plump and are not poisonous but will Perhaps a chemical odour sparks healthy looking, and covered in fester if not removed. offthis reaction and has nothing what I assumed to be some sort The hole you noticed in the to do with the close bond of urticating hairs. Over the side of the cocoon is the exit between the animals. coming my often indiscriminate; they're weeks I kept eye on hole for the moth. The -Julie Peel blurred, fuzzy and out of it, hoping to catch a glimpse Sth Auckland, NZ specimen you sent in had context, o to speak. It is of what would emerge. actually emerged and left the I interesting to note that most Unfortunately never saw it and, empty pupal skin behind, The sexual signals because the cocoon did not split • recorded hybrids (of both which often remains visible A • that exist between or break, I thought maybe plants and animals) are through the hole. The adult males and females in the wild something went wrong and the moths have a wing span of up related to habitat disturbance moth or whatever never are always adapted to the or human intervention. to 16 centimetres. The colour natural or preferred habitat emerged. Then I noticed a small of the female is soft browns Also, natural female re­ in which speciation took hole in the side of the cocoon and and greys, while the male is jection signals often require place. If the habitat is chang­ when I looked through the hole, I darker with strongly con­ vigour. A moribund female could glimpse a shiny body trasting markings. These ed, or if the animal is the may not be able to repel the inside. Can you tell me what moths are found from south­ product of many generations advances of an 'unattractive created the cocoon and what eastern Queensland to Vic­ of captive breeding, as is the suitor', or she may secrete could have happened? toria. case for all domestic animals excessively, or adopt un­ and many zoo and lab natural postures. These may -Stephen Costello -Sally Cowan animals, then the sexual correspond to positive female Balmain, NSW Australian Museum signals are maladapted and signals when sensed by

The larva (left), cocoon (middle) and adu lt moth (right) of the Wh't1 e- stemmed Gum Moth. 78 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 "' nearby males, especially in cats, the Cheetah is the Do big cats like this Tiger purr? � zoos and domestic exception; it can purr, quite � situations. loudly. Big cats occasionally i -Shane F. McEvey make a purring sound but vi Answers to Quiz in � Australian Museum they have to take a breath in ;: between purrs. Small cats Nature Strips (page 16) purr continually and can in 1. Hydrogen ions Big Happy Cats fact purr and miaow at the I was recently nursing same time. Generally this 2. They are all names of •. my Cat while watching a form of communication is documQ entary on wild big cats used to indicate content­ Martian rocks. like Lions, Tigers and Leopards. ment, however this is not 3. Ian Plimer My own little Cat was purring always the case. Domestic away quite loudly and it made Cats that have been badly 4. Anthropomorphism me wonder whether its larger injured might still purr, and relatives are also able to purr? If some purr to indicate 5. Ulcers they can, what is the purpose of dominance over other Cats. 6. Mercury this form of communication? Although kittens purr -Jane Powell naturally when feeding, the 7. Dolly Rose Bay, NSW reaction of purring when stroked by humans does not 8. Rear-opening . Most of the small happen until they are a few 9. Ticks A• cats can purr, most of weeks old. the large ones like Lions and -Linda Gibson 10. Nectar and pollen Tigers cannot. Of the larger Australian Museum

p C T E A s E R Do you recognise this? If you think you know what it is, then send your answer to Pie Teaser, Nature Australia Magazine. Please don't forget to include your name and address. The first correct entry will win a $20 Australian Museum Shop Gift Voucher. Summer's Pie Teaser was a thrips (/dolothrips sp.).

NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 somehow seems perverse to celebrate THE LAST WORD the renewal of life when the land is dying for lack of :vater: .. Even the seemmgly mnocent Rabbit 1s When I aslied who would prefer a bilby over an Easter bunny, falling foul of Australia's uniq�� ecology. the vote was universally in favour of the marsupial. A consummate symbol of fertility for our ancestors, it is widely regarded as a sym­ bol of environmental destruction by Australians. It seemed a stroke of genius, then, when some confectioner THE TRIUMPH hit on the idea of making chocolate bil­ bies.Bilbies are cute and present some superficial parallels with Rabbits.They OF THE EASTER are about the same size, have long ears, delightfully soft fur and they live in bur­ rows.There, however, the similarities BILBY cease, for the omnivorous and carnivo­ rous marsupial bilbies are very different BY TIM FLANNERY ecologically from the herbivorous, pla­ brings, and the risen Son of God and his cental Rabbits.Most inconveniently for message of renewed life. Eggs and the confectioners, bilbies are not good Rabbits, those splendid though pagan symbols of fertility. The Lesser Bilby symbols of fertility, were thus accepted (Macrotis leucura) is already extinct, without demur into the newly while the Bilby or Greater Bilby (M. Christianised festival of Easter. lagotis) is endangered. Although the hybrid nature of the Given the role that Rabbits may have Easter festival rarely incites comment played in the dramatic decline of both among the long-accustomed Europeans, bilby species, there is poetic justice in it can cause confusion in cultures that the usurpation of the Easter bunny by are unfamiliar with il.Several years ago the Easter bilby. Even better, a small per­ s =o AFJm mE a newspaper article mentioned, for centage of the profits made from Easter EuropeanE goddessASTE REostre who embod­ example, that a major Japanese depart­ bilby sales goes towards Bilby conserva­ ies the fertility of the boreal (northern) ment store, confused by the disparate tion. springtime and return of the Sun. It is elements of Easter symbolism, had dis­ Recently I visited my daughter's one of the few Christian celebrations played a gigantic Easter bunny nailed to school to give a talk on deserts. I that still retains its pagan name. This a cross as part of their in-store celebra­ brought a few stuffed animals for the might have something to do with Pope tions. Year Five kids to examine, one of which Gregory's instructions, given to the first Easter and its symbols are beginning was a Bilby.As they felt its deliciously missionaries in England in AD 601, sug­ to sit uneasily with Australians, too, but soft fur, squeals of delight filled the gesting they allow the English to cele­ for quite different reasons.In Australia room.I casually asked how many had brate their festivals in their pagan form Easter is celebrated in autumn, making received a chocolate bilby for Easter, but that they re-dedicate them to the the links with returning fertility and and half the class put up their hands. Christian Goel. renewed life rather strained.Worse, in a When I asked who would prefer a bilby The timing of Christ's death and res­ land dominated by the southern oscilla­ over an Easter bunny next year, the vote urrection fitted in quite nicely with tion, Easter can coincide with gentle, was universally in favour of the marsupial. Eosb·e's fertility festival.So did the link life-giving autumn rains, or with the I suppose that I should just reconcile between the returning Sun and the life it height of a death-dealing drought. Il myself to the addition of the Easter bilby to our already confused cultural bag­ gage. Still,I must admit to feeling a b·ifle uncomfortable at abandoning a fertility ymbol that my European ancestors have celebrated for many thousands of years. If we were to choose a fertile indige­ nous mammal as a more appropriate symbol for Easter, however, our choice would be limited, for most Australian mammals breed relatively slowly or are rare.There are exceptions among the native rodents, but I find it difficult to imagine even the most environmentally aware parent queuing to buy chocolate replicas of our most fecund mammal, the Long-haired or Plague Rat (Rattus villosissimus) .• Dr Tim Flannery is Senior Research Scientist in Mammalogy at the Australian Museum.

The Last Word is an opinion piece and does not necessarily reflectthe views of the Australian Museum.

80 NATURE AUSTRALIA AUTUMN 1998 �...... J.11/USOIA. � ...... -- ·�­""" LE VAILLANT'S PARROTS MU-11-,.1 ICIM ··-·· 23/6 23/7 23/8 23/9 23/10 24/1

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crabs 11/12 VOLUME 25 Creation 'science' 11/70 Ptunarra Brown Butterfly4/20 cultural story-telling 6/70, 9/5 rhinoceros beetles 9/16 Winter t 99S-Autumn J.9 98 skaters 3/1 o cuttlefish11/6 stick-insects 4/30 dehoming 2/10 Note: the numberpreceding the slash denotesthe issue stingless bees 6/50, 9/5, 12/4 dinoflagellates,bioluminescent 10/8 n,unber and the numberfollowing denotes the page termites 5/16, 6/78 issue number 2, startingon pages. diseases, introduced 3/ 4 number, e.g. 215 = tree crickets 3/14 domestication 3/6 vision 9/32 Subject Matter electronic pest repeller 10/79 wasps 7/78 acid rain 1/16 eusociality 5/12, 8/6 water striders 3/10 amphipods 7/16 extraterrestrial intelligence 4/40 White-stemmed Gum Moth 12/78 Antarctica 9fl.4 fish wingless scorpion-flies12/9 asteroids 3/5, 4/5 Atlantic Salmon 9/16 itchiness 1/54 aurorae 10/16 Elephantnose Fish 8/8 leeches 1/4 Australians overseas 12/22 Fathead Minnow alarm signal 6/11 life on other planets 7 /38 autumn leaves 8/9 Guppy 6/11 life spans 9/70 bioprospecting 8/80 Megatooth Shark1/5 logging 1/80 birds parrotfishes4/ 48 Lyme Disease 11/80 Adelie Penguin 10/6 seahorses 3/19, 8/10, 12/56 Macquarie Island 5/64 Australian Magpie 3/78, 4/78, 6/78, 10/32 Slender Seamoth 8/78 male lactation 2/7 AzureKingfisher 2/18 sperm-drinking 6/8 male-male competition 5/30 barn owls2/39 Spotted Handfish 7 /20 mammals Black Kite 6/5 toadfish 4/78, 8/6 Aardvark11/14 Black Wheatear 9/12 flatworms10/24 ant-eating 6/19 Black-chinned Honeyeater 11/22 fossils, from the Sydney Region 11/24 armadillos 5/1 O Black-faced Cuckoo-shrike3/4 frogs Asian Elephant 2/10 Black-faced Solitaire 4/10 cave-breeding 5/1 O Badger 4/15 bowerbirds 5/5 decline in 4/56, 8/4,8/5 beaked whales 12/6 cassowaries4/22 desert 6/16 Bilby 12/80 Comb-crested Jacana 2/26 earless 12/8 Black Rat 6/22, 9/79, 11/5 Common Raven 10/7 early-hatching tadpoles 6/7 Black Rhinoceros 2/1O communication in 1/78 food of 7/79 Black-and-white Tree-kangaroo 1/46 cormorants 7 /6 Giant Burrowing Frog 9/78 Borneobats 2/68 crowing roosters10/11 Green Tree Frog 10/18 Brown Antechinus 3/26 Fairy Penguin5/22 Panamanian Golden Frog 12/8 Brush-tailed Phascogale 2/14 Feral Pigeon 12/18 photoartl 0/62 Capuchin 10/15 flyingformation 10/12 poison-dartfrogs 4/11 cat purring 12/79 Golden-shouldered Parrot5/18 right-handed 8/12 Cat 4/11, 4/80, 7/4, 7/5, 9/5, 11/4, 11/5 Greatnt 1/16, 7/12, 10/5 SquirrelTree Frog 11/14 Central Rock-rat 2/4, 10/12 House Sparrow 4/18 Sunset Frog 6/24 Chacma Baboon 6/15 hummingbirds 1/10, 4/16 ticking 12/48 Chimpanzee 11/10 l'iwi 8/14 fungi 1/62, 2/24, 3/63, 6/4, 8/48 Collared Lemming 12/12 Kea 3/12 giant squids 5/7 cuscus fossils 5/70 lyrebirds 8n8, 10/78 head butting 5/7 Damaraland Mole-rat5/12, 8/6 miners12/32 horsepower 1/18 dasyurids 5/46 nest decoration 9/10 human mate selection 3/16, 6/5 Dayak Fruit-bat 2/7 Ostrich 2/16 humour in science 7/70 Dingo 3/46, 6/4 parental care 9/58 insects diprotodontids 3/70 Pelican4n8, 8/6 African Weaver Ant 11/13 Dugong 9/50 photoart 8/64 ant-plant mutualism 4/11, 9/10 elephant pheromone 9/14 Pied Butcherbird 2/78 bed bugs 1/20 Feathertail Glider 12/24 Puerto Rican Emerald Hummingbird 4/6 bees 1/6 Giraffe 11/8 Red Junglefowl 10/11 Birdwing Butterfly7 /24 Hippopotamus 1/7, 4/6 Red Goshawk 3/30 Blue Flower Wasp 1/78 Horse 1/18 Rock Dove 12/18 bull ants 11/78 House Mouse 9/18 seabirds9/12 bumblebees11/16 Humpback Whale 1/78 sexin butterflyphotoart 12/64 lndo-Pacific Humpbacked Dolphin 6/12 7/5 kangaroo blindness5/78 shags 7/6 Caper White Butterfly 10/78 kangaroos 6/56 5/5, 7 /5 Costa Rican Rove Beetle 3/15 Stitchbird 1/12, Killer Whale 6/8 stone-carrying 9/12 crickets 11/9 sunning European Honeybee 2/6 Kirk's Dik-dik 9/14 behaviour 6/78 Koala 2/30, 3/15, 10/80, 11/70 Superb fireflies11/20 Fairy-wren 7 /18 Leopard Seal 10/6 Wandering Albatross 1/36 frit flies8/14 grass flies8/14 Lion 4/14 White-tailed Black Cockatoo 2/15 Lumholtz's Tree-kangaroo 11/30 White-winged Chough 8/24 House Fly 3/12 human consumption of 3/5 microbats 1/4, 3/18 Willie Wagtail 1/18, 4/4 monkey yawns 5/6 Yellow-throated Honeyeater 2/15 Japanese Yellow Swallowtail Butterfly 12/10 blue leaf-cutting ants 4/7 monotreme fossils 1/68 veins 12/15 Mountain Pygmy-possum 6/40 bush foods8fl.2 Leichhardt's Grasshopper 12/20 cae locusts 3/5 Naked Mole-rat 10/14 cilians 7/6 Namib DesertGolden Mole 12/15 caves, long-homed grasshoppers 3/15 tropical 3/56 6/ 4 New 2ealand rats 12/10 censoring science 7 10/5 mole crickets 10/56 da i8o, Monarch Butterfly11/ 4 North American Porcupine 1/12 msm Northern Hairy-nosed Wombat 2/4 clothing colour bias 1/16 mosquitoes 2/5 moth puddling 9/8 Numbat 9/40 conservation of rare species 9/80 cop mud-dauber wasps 2/20 opossums 5/11 rolites 9/6 Pacific Rat 12/10 copulation calls 6/15 parasitic wasps 2/10, 2/17 pheromones 9/14 Palas Monkey 12/13 corridors, wildlife 8/56, 11/4 temperature-dependent sex determination 8/15 non-flying mammal 11/50 mice 10/40 pollinators, testicles 10/10 pebble-mound polyclad flatworms10/2 4 Platypus 2/18, 2/54, 6/28 ticks 8/40, 11/80 pseudoscorpions 11/78 rainforest rats 3/38 ultra-violet light 3/8 Queensland Photoart 2/62 Red Fox 5/38 underwaterphotography 4/64, 11/64 4/24 reptiles wildlife laws 1/4 rock-wallabies Apatosaurus 6/21 rodent names 6/80 yawning 5/6 3/10 basilisks 8/8 RodriguesFruit-bat Dragon 8/32 8/12 Boyd's Forest Rufous Hare-wallaby 6/21 Authors and Titles Echidna 11/58 'Brontosaurvf Short-beaked chameleons 6/6 Short-finnedPilot Whale 6/16 Common Wolf Snake 1/15 ABBOTT, I. Censoring CALM !Letter! 10/5 Short-nosed Fruit-bat7 /15 crocodiles 4/70 ADAM, P. &KING, R.J. Humans don't eat rocks 3/80 small desert mammals 7 /54 dinosaurs 4/8, 5/15, 6/21, 10/15, 11/7 ALFORD, R.A. & RICHARDS, S.J. Frog declines !Letter! 8/4 SouthernRight Whale 1/28 ANG, H. & NEWMAN, L. Dressed to kill 10/24 1/22 feathered dinosaur 10/15 Spectaded Hare-wallaby APLIN, K. IReview oO Mammals of New Guinea 7/72 2/4 Frilled Lizard 4/7 Spinifex Hopping-mouse 7 /30 ARCHER, M. Mysteryof the multiplying monotremes 1/68 Hamster 2/6 Gould's Goanna SyrianGolden 11/7 -Borneo bats and sweaty insights 2/68 11/5 humped dinosaurs tapirs 8/10, 8/8 Madonna & child 3/70 bats 7/15 Jesus Christlizards -Miocene tent-building 11/78 -(rocodiledinners and diners 4/70 Thylacine 8/70, 12/4 Lace Monitor hat 9/17 -Possum patternsplucked from stone 5/70 WesternBarred Bandicoot 8/20 lizard's algal 10/20 -Evolution after death 6/70 whales 9/24, 11/8 Mallee Worm-lizard wombat parasites 2/4 MarineIguana 9/6 -Tickling the dull out of taxonomy 7/70 wombats 10/70, 12/5 MaryRiver Turtle3/22 -Tiger, tiger out of sight 8/70 Mars 7/38, 8/9 Oviraptor5/15 -The lengthening limits of life 9/70 menopause 11/10 pterosaurs 6/10 -Worries about withering wombats 10/70 mining versus agriculture 3/80 Sand Monitor 7 /30 -Koalas: apostles vs fossils 11/70 Miracle of Bolsena 3/18 sex determinationin 8/15 -Fried and footless fossil !angers 12/70 mites 6/14 Shingleback 6/34, 7 /14, 9/4, 10/4 ATTENBROW,V.!Review ofl Theencydopaedia of Nature Australia magazine 1/26 Sleepy Lizard, see Shingleback Aboriginal Australia 1/72 Nestbox Project 5/56 snakebite 8/15 BAMFORD, M. Faithful Bobtails !Letter! 10/4 newts 12/14 snake food 5/15, 9/4 BARKER, L. Magnificent mimics [Letter! 5/5 nicotine 7/4 snake fossils 12/70 BATTAM, H.The Wandering Albatross 1/36 nuptial gifts3/16, 12/6 snake tongues 1/10 BAYCHELIER, P.E.J.Thename of the Dingo ILetterl 6/4 octopuses 11/40 snake toxin 9/7 BAYLY,K. Who's to blame? [Letter! 11/4 Otzi10112 SouthernLeaf-tailed Gecko 9/78 BELLWOOD, D. Coral reef crunchers 4/48 palaeontology 5/80 ThornyDevil 4/4, 8/5 BENGSTON, C. Sexy legs 1/7 pearls 9/15 turtle migration 9/7 --Owning a pet is good for you 1/11 peripatus 1/7, 3/7 Turtle-headed Sea Snake 11/13 -Horsepower 1/18 pets 1/11 Tyrannosaurus rex 2/ 46, 7 /7, 7 /8, 10/7 -Sobering herbs for hamsters 2/6 plants Water Python 10/8 -Nursing fathers association? 2/7 Australians in South Africa 10/22 Yellow-bellied Pond SliderTurtle 7/12 -Fluffy-tailed foot-tappers 2/14 Australians overseas 12/22 rocks, sliding 11/15 -Growing money on trees 3/11 Bitou Bush 10/4 salamanders 6/20 -(rickets tell the temperature 3/14 bitter-tasting 6/26 science, censorship of 7 /80, 10/5 -Ford Pill from the forest 4/10 Burseraschlechtendalii 7 /10 science, humour in 7 /80 buzz-pollinated3/13 -(razy cats? 4/11 sea-slugs 2/78 -A relationship made in heaven 4/11 epiphytes 4/11 Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence 4/40 eucalypts overseas 7/46, 11/4 -Double or nothing 5/11 sex, between species12/78 -In a flap over dinner 7 /6 eucalyptus oil 3/11 slugs, carnivorous 10/6 -Plants on the warpath 7 /10 Finger Cheny9/4 snails 8/18 -Insects and elephants follow the same scent 9/14 Hakea trifurGJta2/15 snow, coloured 5/78 -Beetles shoulder the burden 9/16 hibiscuses 4/4 soil crusts 10/48 -Flying by numbers 10/11 laxative 7/4, 10/4 spider webs 10/17 lichens 10/48 spiders -(olour-blind cuttlefish 11/6 - 'Feets' of strength 11/13 liverworts 10/48 comb-footed spiders 3/79 mangroves 8/78 corolla 8/14 -Blue blood 12/15 BENNETT, N. Are canids eusocial? !Reply to Letter! 8/6 marigolds 2/5, 4/79, 8/6 Diaea ergandros 6/6 medicinal use of 10/15 fishing spiders 12/6 BENNION, D. Caring for wildlife [Letter] 9/5 mosses 10/12, 10/48 Goliath Spider 6/14 BERRY, R.W. Wombats, genetics and politics [Letter] 12/5 nectar-producing 5/20 hunting spiders 12/12 BIELEFELDT-OHMANN, H. & FITZPATRICK, D.R. Hanging orchids 4/6 huntsman spiders 2/8 out for rain !Letter] 3/4 palms Australian native plants: 2/5 Leaf-curling Spider 7 /78 BLAXELL, D.F. !Reviewof] in landscaping and pandanus 1/4, 9/4, 12/5 money spiders 3/79 propagation, cultivation and use pitcher plants 9/10 Eucalyptus: an illustrated guide to identifiGJtion9172 orb-weaving spiders 12/40 Sacred Lotus 12/7 Parawixia bistriata -!Review oO Australian flora 12/73 seagrasses 11/78 Redback Spider 3/20, 9/11 BOLES, W.E. !Answer to] Bird talk 1/78 seeds of seashore plants 7/22 Slit Spider 6/10 -!Answer to] Living with butchers 2/78 semi-carnivorous11/6 St Andrews Cross Spider 10/17 -!Answer to] Bird behaviour 3/78 smoke-induced germination 7/10 tarantulas 1/54, 5/4 -!Answer to] Avian pox 4/78 tea trees 3/2 4 tent spiders 3/79 -!Answer to]Toxic toadfish for dinner 4/78 thorny 11/18 velvet spiders 6/11 -I Review oO "Voices of Subtropical Rainforests· 5/73 Tingle Tail-flower 9/20 wolf spiders 4/12 -!Answer to] Mysterious skull? 5/78 Tobacco 4/79 squids 5/7 -[Answer to] Strange bird behaviour 6/78 under-ground fruiting cucumber 11/14 stabilimenta 10/17 -[Answer to] Practice makes perfect 8/78 weeds 1/24, 2/80 Stradbroke Island -[Review oO Birds of Queensland's wet tropicsand wild 9/22 flowers 6/64 Tasmanian carnivores Great Barrier Reefl0/72 Wollemi 5/46 Pine 2/22, 5/4 Tasmanian Photoart -[Review oO The Graham Pizzey & Frank Knight field politics12/5 7 /64 taxonomy 7/70 guide to the birds of Australia 12/72 ng birds -!Review oij Findi in Australia's Northern GEORGES, A. MaryRiver Turtle3/22 -Mushrooms: samplewith care 2/24 Territory12m GIBSON, L. !Review oij The wombat: Common Wombats -Australia's weed scandal 2/80 -!Review oij Australian bird sounds audio tapes 12/74 in Australia 9173 ENBURY, J. Insect vision 9/32 -!Answer to I Leviathan feats 1/78 -Locusts: insects or trees? !Reply to Letter] 3/5 BRACK -The truth about tea trees 3/24 BRAITHWAITE, R. Rats, revenue & reconciliation 6/80 -I Review ofl The book of dolphins 10/72 , Bill. Hopping-mice ILetterJ 2/4 -The cassowary'slast meal 4/22 BREED -!Answer tol Big happy cats 12/79 -(ats:scoundrels or scapegoats? 4/80 BROOME, L. Life among the boulders6/40 GILL, P. Whales in the freezer 9/24 dung 3/15 -Land of nectar 5/20 BULL, K.Thy will be GILLANDERS, A.J. Checking the facts ILetterJ 2/5 survivors6/14 GOLDI -Bitter barks and berries 6/2 6 -Mitey NGAY, R. & CARTHEW, S.The forgotten pollinators -Plant laxatives!Letter] 7 /4 -a-do little 10/10 11/50 -Cock -(atsare a problem !Reply to Letter! 7/5 -Scaly scrapers 11/13 GORTER, J.D. K-T anomalies ILetterJ 4/5 flee11/1 4 -The amazing voyages of sea beans 7/22 -�e and GOTTFRIED, M.D. Megatooth Sharks !Letter] 1/5 -Trees of the future 7/46 -Genital eyes 12/10 GOWING, G. !Review oij Australianrainforest plants IV2/73 12/12 -A bush foods boom? 8/22 -Lemming latrines GRANDJEAN, C. Frog attractant ILetterJ 3/5 -Strolls on Stradbroke 9/22 Liards: paired for life 6/34 BULL, M. Sleepy GRAY,M.The worm, the spider and the coffee cup 2/8 -Invading Africa 10/22 !Reply to Letter! 10/4 -Fa�hful Bobtails -!Answer toJ Spider pyramids3/78 -Thornythoughts 11/18 for Mr Right 1/28 BURNELL, S. Looking GREEN, L. Batting order ILetterJ 1/4 -Made in Australia 12/22 M. Pandanuspalms ILetterJ 9/4 CAIRN-DUFF, -Flora !Letter] 7/5 LOWE, I. Censoring science7/80 tol Seamoths CAMERON, L. !Answer 8/78 -Cock sure !Letter! 11/5 -(ensoringCALM !Reply to Letter] 10/5 -!Answer tol It's a rat! 9/78 -The sightless tiger ILetterJ 12/4 ' LOWE, K.!Review oij Photographing Australia's birds 6m -!Answer to] 'Eyeballs 10/78 GREEN, P.Fungal artistry 1/62 -IReview oij WilsonsPromontory coastalwilderness MacquarieIsland 5/64 nm CARMICHAEL, N. GREENSLADE, P. & LOWE, L. Leichhardt's Grasshopper -I Review oij AnAustralian landscape:the Flinders CARN-DUFF,M. !Review ofl The Whitsunday's book: 12/20 Ranges 11/73 a key to adventure 5/72 GROSS, P.Blinding cherry!Letter] 9/4 MAGRATH, M.J.L.The politics of parenting: an avian CARR, S. Moving forward !Letter! 11/5 HARVEY, M.S. IAnswer to I Tissue-curling spider 7/78 perspective 9/58 CHAPMAN,T:Black-ch inned Honeyeater 11/22 -!Answer to I Frog or toad? 9/78 -& ELGAR, M.A.The struggle for sexual success 5/30 CHRISTI DIS, L. & HOLDERNESS,T. A miner challenge 12/32 -!Answer to] A mysterious tail 9/78 MAJOR, R. !Review oij Ecology and sustainabilityof CILENTO,N. Dr Jekyll with the pied hyde 10/32 -!Answer toJTiny hitch-hiker 11/78 southerntemperate ecosystems 2no CLARIDGE,A W.Trufflejunkies 8/48 HEARD, T. Stinglessbees 6/50 MARKS, C.A. & SHORT, R.V. Out-foxing the fox 5/38 CLODE, D. Like mother like daughter 3/26 HEINSOHN, R. When good help is hard to find 8/24 MARNANE, B. Chinese whisper ILetterJ 9/5 COGGER, H. !Review of] Frogcalls of the Greater Sydney HENSCHEL, J.R. AC-DC spider 6/11 MARSH, H. Going, going, Dugong 9/50 Basin; Frogcalls of north-eastern New South Wales; HERO, J.-M. Frog dedines !Letter] 8/4 MARSHALL, 5. Northernexposure 3/64 Frog calls of Brisbane and south-eastern Queensland HICKEY, G. Chile and leeches !Reply to Letter! 1/4 MARTIN, R. Koala politics 10/80 E; __ 8m -Celebrate solstice 1/10 McEVEY,SJ. !Review of] How to attract butterfliesto your COLMAN, P.!Answer to] Common Glaucus 2/78 -Stitchbirds come face-to-face 1/12 garden 9/72 CORBETT,L. Dingoes: expatriate wolves or native dogs? -Checking the facts !Reply to Letter] 2/5 -!Answer to] Mixed signals 12/78 3/46 -Mite pockets 2/17 McGHEE, K.Two tips are better than one 1/10 CORK, S. Life in a salad bowl? 2/30 -The Platypus and the kingfisher 2/18 -(olour-biasbirds 1/16 COSTELLO, P.Comm ents from abroad !Letter! 5/4 -Naming the Wollemi Pine !Reply to Letter! 5/4 -Acid chain 1/16 COWAN, S. !Answer tol Cocoon of danger 12/78 -Fish drink sperm 6/8 -Itching for a switch 2/10 CULLEN, M., BLAKE,N. & BICKHAM, M. Urban penguins -Desert frogs have it in the bag 6/16 -The dehom of Africa 2/11 5/22 -An evolutionarydead end 7/14 -Leaf the fruit alone 2/15 CUNNINGHAM, M. Frog dedines !Letter] 8/4 -Gastric grooming and right-handed toads 8/12 -When boys will be girls 2/17 DAWS, A.G.The harmonious mole cricket 10/56 -Skimming the fat 10/6 -Wollemi Pine 2/22 DE ROSA, S. Chile and leeches !Letter] 1/4 HO, L. !Review oij Plantsof thePerth coast and islands4173 -The dilemma of domestication 3/6 DEVOOS, A. !Review oij Mammals of the South-west HOBBS, R.J.The right path or roads to nowhere? 8/56 -Giant stride for skaters 3/10 Padficand Moluccan Islands 7/72 HOLLANDS, D. Silent hunters of the night 2/38 -Fat-bellied females can be fatal 3/12 DEBUS, S. Red Goshawk 3/30 HOLLIS, J. !Review oij Rocks & fossils 8/73 -Making a meal of reproduction 3/15 -Raptor ID ILetter] 6/5 HOOK, C. !Review ofl The incomplete book of Australian -Laws of attraction 3/16 DEMONG, N.J. & EMLEN, S.T. Signals of the flesh2/26 mammals 11/72 -Two dinosaur heads are better than one 4/8 DICKMAN, C. Vagrants of the desert 7 /54 HUDSON, B. DoesLyme Disease occur in Australia? -Poisonprey makes poison frogs 4/11 DIRCKS, A.Thin hides? !Letter] 10/5 11/80 -Square eyes and hairylegs 4/12 DOGGETT,S.Ticks 8/40 HUGHES, L. When an insect is more like a plant 4/30 -Burying Badger mythology 4/15 DOLLIN, A. Why do native stingless bees fight? !Letter! HUGHES, R. Pandanusdieback explained !Letter] 12/5 -Monkey yawns 5/6 12/4 HUTTON, J. Cats and rats !Letter] 11/5 -An armadillo nose its kin 5/10 DOWNES, S., HANDASYDE, K. & ELGAR, M. Researchon INGLEBY, S. Spectacled Hare-wallaby 1/22 -From egg robber to caring parent 5/14 corridors ILetterJ 11/4 -I Review of] Tracks, seats and other traces: a field guide -Supreme sacrifice 6/6 DREW,H. Why do native stingless bees fight?!Letter! 9/5 to Australian mammals 9/72 -Teaching beaching 6/8 DRISCOLL, D. What makes ticking frogs tick? 12/48 JOBSONF, P.!Review ofl Field guide to the orchids of New -Pterosaurflight 6/10 DwYER,T. Eyewitness accounts !Letter! 12/4 South Wales and Victoria 11/73 -Life in a slit without silk 6/10 ELDRIDGE, D. Caretakers of the desert 10/48 JONES, M. Clash of the carnivores 5/46 -(opulationcalls 6/15 ELGAR, MA. Why does williewag? 1/18 JONES, R. !Review oij Listen... Our land is aying. -Smoking or non-smoking? 7/10 --cannibalism before 12/6 Australia's environment: problems and solutions 12/73 -Autumn leaves questions 8/9 sex -Webs of stone 8/14 -Maybe size does count 12/40 JOSEPH, L. Singing willies !Letter] 4/4 ELIOTT, S. Bee cure -Bringing home the baleen? 11/8 -l'iwi bills 8/14 for cancer 1/6 -Some like it hot 8/15 -Hippos in stereo 1/7 KEABLE, s. !Answer to] Fish balls or beach balls? 11/78 ERF RARI, J. Koala KERRYON, B. Wombats, genetics and politics !Letter] 12/5 -The geography of snakebites 8/15 in the pond 3/15 -Snake toxins aren't all venom 9/7 FLANNERY,T. lrian LARSON,P.L.To sex a rex2/46 Jaya's new tree-kangaroo: just the tip -See-through nests? 9/10 of th e Ertz LAST, P.R.& BRUCE, B. Spotted Handfish 7/20 berg? 1/46 -Pearlsof wisdom 9/15 -!Review oij The W.F. Killer rats of the Queensland rainforest dingo in Australia and Asia 5/72 LAURANCE, -Lemon-scented monkeys 10/15 -The triumph of the Easter bilby 12/80 3/38 FLECKER, P. Queensland's frogs croaking? 4/56 -Dinosaurs get the hump 11/7 Supine Stitchbirds !Letter] 5/5 -Why are -In support of menopausalwomen 11/10 �RANKUN, B. I Review oij The volcanic Earth 7173 -Frog dedines !Reply to Letter! 8/5 RIEN !Letter! 5/4 -The Aardvark and the cucumber 11/14 D,T. Numbats on a junk food diet 9/40 LEECH, R.The truth about tarantulas RFT !Letter] 7/5 -Bumblebees shun lopsided flowers 11/16 G I H, C. & D. Magnificent mimics !Reply to Letter] 5/5 LETH BRIDGE, R. Avian sex ARNETT, Wild flowers 6/64 -Hot lotus 12/7 S. & CROWLEY G . Golden-shouldered Parrot LOCH MAN, J. McGROUTHER, M. !Review ofl Tropical reef fishes: a 5/18 ' LOW, T.Pleistocene pandanus !Letter] 1/4 GAR 1/24 marine awareness guide 5/72 SON, M. Marine resources: cure-all or lose all? 8/80 -Weeds: the forgotten foods - -Lost and lung less 7 /6 temperate Australia 3173 G.M. !Review ofl Possums of the world: a -Surting clams 7/7 McKAY, Eating on the run 11/78 monograph of the Phalangeroidea1/73 SADLIER, R. !Answer tol -Divining turtles7 /12 Richmond Birdwing 7/24 McNAMARA, G. Silly statistics? !Reply to Letter! 3/5 SANDS, D. & SCOTT,S. -Tent-pitching bats 7/15 -Is anybody out there? 4/40 SAUNDERS, B. Seashots 11/64 -Fish brains take the record 8/8 the Wollemi Pine [Letter! 5/4 -Did Martians ever exist? 7 /38 SCHMUTZ, E. Naming -Lizards walk on water 8/8 Platypus pursuits 2/54 -Martians at last? 8/9 SERENA, M. -Scare tactics for endangered animals 8/13 monotremes 6/28 king kill? 10/7 -Metropolitan -Forest dragons 8/32 -{ouldthe lesson !Letter! 8/6 -Daylight aurorae 10/16 SERVENTY, V. Toadfish -Iguana sex 9/6 R.S. Sand-swimming moles 12/15 MEEK, P.Fox trots !Letter! 10/4 SEYMOUR, -Magnetic map readers 9/7 SHARP,A. Wallabies on the rocks? 4/24 MEREDITH, P.Head start for peripatus 3/7 in question -Pass the parcel 9/8 (Review ofl Snakes 12/72 MESIBOV, B.The farmer and the flower: a fable 9/80 SHEA, G. -Antgarbos 9/10 SHEMESH, !. Tasmania in focus 7/64 MILLAR, A. !Answer to! Coloured snow 5/78 8/5 -When size doesn't count 9/12 Seaweeds of Queensland: naturalist's SHERBROOKE, W.C. Watch & learn[Letter! -!Review of) a Uluru: looking afterUluru-Kata -Stay-at-home salmon 9/16 guide sn3 SKATES, A. !Review ofl -Lizard's green beret 9/17 Tjuta-theAnangu way 2/70 MIRTSCHIN, P.Cats are a problem !Letter! 7 /4 -Raven roosts 10/7 SLATER, P.Balding birdos from Tasmania? 2/14 MORRIS, J. Kea attack 3/12 to Australian -Pythons on the move 10/8 (Review ofl A field guide MORRISON, R. The Nestbox Project 5/56 SMITHERS, C. -The testide conundrum 10/10 ins butterflies2/71 MOULDS, M.S. IAnswer tol Blue Flower Wasp Hidden rainforests: subtropicalrainforests -Fat and lazy mole-rats 10/14 -!Review of) Butterflies of Tasmania 2/72 -[Review ofl and their biological diversity3/72 -Silky lures 10/17 -!Answer tol Flying frenzy 6n8 -(rab deansers 11/12 A field guide to insects in Australia -!Answer to l Wayward buttertlies10/78 -[Review of) 10/73 -Who said earless frogscan't hear? 12;8 SPATE, A. Wee Jasper caves [Letter!6/4 -!Answer to! Random feast 11/78 -Silk gift wrapping 12/12 Penguins of the world STRAHAN, R. Nature's diamond jubilee 1/26 MURRAY, M.D. !Review of) 2n2 TOYLE, Bill. Silly statistics? [Letter! 3;5 SULLIVAN, R. Self-quilling: an occupational hazard 1/12 NATURE FOCUS PHOTO LIBRARYTropical frogs 10/62 TRNSKI, T. (Review ofJ Australian marine life: the plants -A threat to Christmas? 1/15 _ -Flutter-bys 12/64 and animals of temperate waters 1on2 NAUMANN, I. !Answer tol When wasps meet 7 /78 -Keeping your meal cool 2/10 TRUSCOTT, P.Nicotine kills [Letter! 7/4 NEWELL, G. Lumholtz'sTree-kangaroos 11/30 -Ostriches: cheap eats? 2/16 TURNER, R. !Answer to! Hopping blind 5178 NEWLAND, M. Ptunarra Brown Buttertly 4/20 -Obstetric bats 3/10 UNDERHILL, D. Palmpaper [Letter] 2;5 NIELSEN, L. QuintessentialQueensland 2/62 -Blood on the bread 3/18 6/5 NORMAN, M.D. Australian octopuses 11/40 -Hippo leech 4/6 USHER, K. Attracting men (Letter! OPALA, R. A prickly mistake [Letter] 4/ 4 -Lions spot the difference 4/14 VAN DYCK, S. In bed with the reds 1/20 OSBORNE, A. (Review ofl Layers of time: the Blue -Cinderellas of the bird world 4/16 -Mud-slinging spider stingers 2/20 Mountains and their geology 11/72 -Head butts: surviving the impact 5/7 -A Redback affair 3/20 PARNABY, H. Hollow arguments 1/80 -Spinning to order 5/10 -House Sparrows: the last straw 4/18 -(Review of) Future of the fauna of western New South -Whales carry the dead 6/16 -Termites: behind the veneer 5/16 Wales3m -Sizing up ant-eaters 6/19 -Ratbags of the ratters 6/22 -(Review of) Wildlife & woodchips: Leadbeater's -Hot Rex? 7/7 -Wrens through the eye of a sceptic 7 /18 Poss_um-a test case for sustainable forestry8/72 -Careful Rex 7 /8 -Snails: where boys will be girls 8/18 -(Review of) Bats in question ll/72 -The cost of being fat 7 /12 -House Mouse rouse 9/18 PARSONS, C. The humpbacks of Hong Kong Harbour -Repellent and sunblock in one 7 /16 -Raising a glass to the loo lord 10/18 6/12 -Faithful seahorses 8/10 --Queensland pebble-mound mice... up from the tailings PATON, P. !Review of) Cuckoos, nigh/birds and kingfishers -Tapir penis 8/10 10/40 of Australia1/71 -Oldest coprolites 9/6 -Breaking the flasher's code 11/20 PETERSEN, D. Locusts: insects or trees? !Letter! 3;5 -Redback suicide 9/11 -(ulture's vultures 12/18 A field manual forthe amateur POGSON,_R. IReview of) -Seabirds smell their dinner 9/12 VANCLAY, J. Conservation (/)laws [Letter! 1/4 geologist: tools and activitiesf or exploring our planet -Useless dik-dik 9/14 VAVRYN, D. Flat food [Letter! 9/4 4n3 -Meat-eating slugs? 10/6 VERKEST, K. Are canids eusodal? !Letter! 8/6 PROSKE, U. Itch, prickle and tarantula 1/54 -�ioluminescent burglar alarms 10/8 VINCENT, A. Seahorses under siege 12/56 -Hopping mad 6/56 -Otzi'smossy underwear? 10112 VOGEL NEST, L. [Review of) Aliya: stories of the elephants -Giraffeswin by a neck ll/8 -Semi-carnivorousplants 1116 of Sri Lanka 6n2 -Echidnas on the nose u;5s -The ghost of Death Valley? 11115 RADFORD, WARD, S. Feathertail Gliders 12/24 R.Viva Sleepy Lizard! !Letter] 9/4 -Beaked whales suck 12/6 RANDELL, WARDELL-JOHNSON, G.Tingle Tail-flower9/20 B. UV invitations 3/8 -New Zealand rats 12/10 REA ER, Whale Sharks: the giants -, ROBERTS, D. & HORWITZ, P. The Sunset Frog 6/24 � S. !Review ofl of -Blue balls 12/13 Nmgaloo Reef 1/70 WARNER, L. Invisible parasites !Letter! 2/4 SUTHERLAND. L · IR ev,ew·. ofl Natural hazards: their RIC_HARDS, G !Review With wings on their fingers- an . ' WATTS, D. Feathered portraits 8/64 _. of) potential m the PadficSouthwest ones in mt ,mate view of the flying-fox 6/72 WEBB, G. (Review ofl A fossicker'sguide to gemst 2171 SZALAY, A. RIC DS, J. Man of the alpine forest 1/52 Australia 12/72 i�� & SHORT, J. Western Barred Bandicoot TA�ON, Rock art P.S.C. !Review ofJ of the D'eamt·" ,me WEBB, N. Cats are a problem !Letter! 7/4 10/73 RITCHIE, A. !Review of) The rise of fishes WEINSTEIN, P.In the dark about tropical caves 3/56 4n2 THOMAS, A. Sonic ROBERTSON, P.Mallee Worm-lizard symmetiy 1119 -Wee Jasper caves [Reply to Letter! 6/4 10/20 -Worms, take ROBINSON,M. !Review of) The edge of extinetion- your leaves 11/l 0 WESTAWAY,M. Prehistoric infections !Letter) 3/4 Austra//a,s threatened THOMPSON , G . G oannas wildlife 1/72 in the graveyard 7 /30 WHITLA, J. The Devil's drink !Letter! 4/4 Caring TOLHURST, W. Design les -IRev_1ew of) for possums 4/72 by nature 9/66 WILLIAMS, G. !Review ofl Australian beet 1no Spotf TORR, G. Animal -!Review of) ht id d Ws a frog's life magnetism 2/6 WILLIAMS, S.J. Butterflytrees !Letter! 11/4 -!Answer Pla�fs v�::S ::� 4n3 -Buzzing to a different dinosaurs: on the trail tol p n9 tune 3/12 WILLIS, P.M.A.(Review of! Hunting -!Review o",, ,an frogs·a ma crobats: why are they so small? of prehistoric monsters Austral· � . zm· g amphibians61 73 =�; 3/18 3/72 - Review of) Frogs and ep 'esU of egnant males can still be ! the Sydney Region _ macho 3/19 -Viva palaeontology 5/80 12/74 -When a little is enough 4/6 -Brontosaurus. doubly dead 6/21 -!Review of) Attracting ;ogs to o -Fnlls with chills? 417 o history of fi y ur garden7173 -!Review of) Australia's lost w rld: a -!Answer Frog food ,or -Vibratingants 4n . to) th ought7/79 Australia's backboned animals 9n3 -IRev1ew of) Frogs Tasmania -Free rides out of frog 8/72 hollow 5/10 -Feathered dinosaur 10/15 -!Answer to) Frog and pes_trepellers -Sex (or. lack of ·it ) ·in mole-rat 10179 � society 5/12 -Sydney's fossil treasures 11/24 ROMANOWSKI N .�onservat1on - eeding on flattened ' . (f)laws !Letter) 1/4 food 5/15 WOHLMUTH, H. Marigold mixup !Letter! 8/6 ROWLAND, P. 1Rev1ew Austra ,an birds -Chameleon's telephoto of) r of prey 7 /72 eye 6/6 WURST, D. Rock-rats alive! 10/12 ROWLANDS P.. Newtrif1ous -Hatch or be snatched eggs? 12/14 6/7 YEATES, D. Wingless scorpion-fly 12/9 ROYAL BOTANIC GARDENS -Predators to the rescue? . SYDNEY !Answer to) Means 6/11 ZEIDLER, W. Forget the calamari! 5/7 of survival 8/78 -Sneaky guppies 6/11 RUDMAN, W. B. I Revi oastal -Spider's velcro ew o",, C marine ecology of defence 6/14 -Roly-poly salamander 6/20 --