Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central Australia And Overland From Adelaide To King George's Sound In The Years 1840-1: Sent By The Colonists Of South Australia By Eyre, Edward John
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Wallabies Are Of Many Kinds, And Are Killed In Various Ways.
By hunting
with bwirris, by nets, by digging out of the ground; the larger sorts, as
rock wallabies, by spearing, and several kinds by making runs, into which
they are driven.
In hunting with bwirris (a short heavy stick with a knob
at one end) a party of natives go out into the scrub and beat the bushes
in line, if any game gets up, the native who sees it, gives a peculiar
"whir-rr" as a signal for the others to look out, and the animal is at
once chased and bwirris thrown at him in all directions, the peculiar
sound of the "whir-rr" always guiding them to the direction he has taken.
It rarely happens that an animal escapes if the party of natives be at
all numerous.
In netting the wallabies, a party of seven or eight men go in advance,
with each a net of from twenty to forty feet long, and when they arrive
near the runs, usually made use of by these animals, a favourable spot is
selected, and the nets set generally in a line and nearly together, each
native concealing himself near his own net. The women and children who,
in the mean time had been making a considerable circuit, now begin to
beat amongst the bushes with the wind, shouting and driving the wallabies
before them towards the nets, where they are caught and killed.
Other species of the wallabie burrow in the ground like rabbits, and are
dug out.
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