Northern Aranda

(map)

The Northern Aranda people prepared sugar gathered from the branches of the mulga tree. A ceremonial song telling of the story below is sung to produce, it is believed, a similar "flood" of mulga sugar to cover the trees in the area. The ritjalitjala bird is said to have a bluish or dark gray body and a red mouth.

The ritjalitjala bird spent all his time gathering mulga branches covered with mulga sugar and preparing them by soaking them in a vessel of water. The vessel quivered and shook like a living thing, overturning of its own accord, and Ritjalitjala could not right it again. As he rested from his efforts, the sweet liquid from the vessel grew into a flood and covered him.

T.G.H. Strehlow, Songs of Central Australia (Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1971), 290-292.