Would you like bogong moths with that? (by Caroline Salisbury, Friday, April 20, 2007)
"The high fat content of bogong moths – 38.8 grams of fat for a 100g portion, more then [sic] three times that of a hamburger, provide an energy dense food for indigenous groups in cold climates".100g (nearly 4 oz) is the standard amount used on food packaging here to list the amount of things like sodium, fats, sugars, kilojoules, etc. I think you'd need a fair amount of moths to make that up, but in season there'd be feasts.
(Bogong's behaviour is the reason I know the words aestivate, and estivation.)
The rest of the article is quite interesting, about getting standards for eating bush tucker during kidney disease, and the problem of good food in remote areas.
According to Don Herbison-Evans, "a Bogong was unjustly blamed for embarrassing Yvonne Kenny while she was singing the Olympic Hymn in the closing ceremony of the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games, as it landed for a while on her [dress]. In fact there were several moth species including Bogongs attracted to the brilliant arena floodlighting that evening, and the one on Yvonne's dress appeared actually to be a hawk moth of the species Hippotion scrofa."List of Links
Factsheet: www.csiro.au/ resources/ ps1qn.html
CSIRO pic: www.ento.csiro.au/ ecowatch/ Primary/ butterflies/ pages/ bogong_cluster.htm
Basic Entomology (Sydney Uni): bugs.bio.usyd.edu.au/Entomology/ importance/ imagePages/ bogongMoth.html
Family info fr CSIRO: www.ento.csiro.au/ ecowatch/ Lepidoptera/ noctuidae.htm
ABC scribbly gum on Moth migration: www.abc.net.au/ science/ scribblygum/ november2002/default.htm
page on Unique Australian Animals site: home.iprimus.com.au/ readman/ bogong.htm
Almanac, a big page with assorted November information: www.wilsonsalmanac.com/ book/ nov26.html
short piece from Wildlife of Sydney site: www.faunanet.gov.au/ wos/ factfile.cfm?Fact_ID=204
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