Perhap worth recalling Miles Franklin's quoll memories in her "Childhood
at Brindabella: My first ten years (orig. 1963)" (pp. 97-8). After
moving from "Bobilla" to "Stillwater",
"The native cats were a definite excitement. We had not been familiar
with them at Bobilla because of the variety of dogs that abounded. At
Stillwater they would clear a roost in a night, leaving piles of
corpses with only the blood sucked from their necks. They were
long-snouted and bloodthirsty with dark soft coats dotted with white
like hailstones. Firm defensive measures were necessary. The free
birds, including the turkeys, had to be confined to specific roosting
trees, the trunks of which had wide collars of tin. Ladders that helped
the birds up were taken away after dark.....
The men laid traps to lessen the pests,. We would find as many as six
or eight dead at a time. With the lack of squeamishness of our years,
we use to rifle the pouches of the females for the rows of kittens like
hairless mice. What glorious furs these cats would have provided.
Mother made us little tippets and muffs for frosty days. but no one
then or there wore fur coats...
I never saw a native cat after that.Since their extermination the
imported foxes have increased to take their places and to make secure
fowlhouses still a necessity.
One day in later years inChicago I saw one of the McCormick ladies
wearing a beautiful fur coat that so took my taste that I stroked it,
remarking "Its exactly like the native cats of my childhood".
"I'm interested to hear that. I have never seen another coat like it.
The fur people can't place it, but where I bought it in Vienna they
told me it was Australian wild cat."
Other days!
Robin Hide
Ian Fraser wrote:
Good try Martin, but no cigar on this occasion..... I'm not entirely
convinced that even two healthy quolls are going to make too much of a
dent on the wild bird population, though they might account for the odd
back-yard chook or so.
These characters (ie this one and the one a month or so back in the
same area) have almost certainly done what a couple of previous West
Belc Qs have done - ie been young blokes chucked out of the family
territory in the Brindies or Tindbinbillas, followed the Murrumbidgee
down, and then trundled up the Jerra Creek to suburbia (maybe drawn by
the smell of chooks...). They're not happy in suburbia and are probably
quite relieved to be back in the bush (as long as dad doesn't catch
them...).
cheers
IF
martin butterfield wrote:
An astonishing record. In view of the diet of quolls, it
might explain a shortage of birds in the area!
Martin
On Thu, Feb 18, 2010 at 9:39 AM, Marnix
Zwankhuizen <m("aec.gov.au","Marnix.Zwankhuizen");">>
wrote:
UNCLASSIFIED
Not
bird related but very
interesting nonetheless.
UNCLASSIFIED
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