Birds
December 15th 2008 23:15
I know I keep saying it, but those baby Koels are throwing out our whole bird population.
The currawongs are SO compassionate - they dont want to feed them anymore, indeed, dont want to be anywhere near them, yet they continue to return to the wide open mouths and flapping wings, trying to encourage the babies to hunt, or at least come to us for some free snacks. The Koals are stubborn, cuckoo childs, who stubbornly refuse to hunt and even droop their wings miserably in a bid to convince their foster parents they will die of starvation. The currawongs nip through the trees, swinging almost, through the tinyest of gaps and scuttling along branches. When their adopted chicks try this, they wobble in an ungainly fashion. When they try to fly, their huge wingspan fills the spaces between the woody trees, almost catching their wingtips, so they have to land again quite quickly. Both parents and children are confused at the difference of their movements. But the currawongs are desperately trying to wean them, they look so tired, so stressed. I really hope they wont be too worn out after the enfants terrible and have some of their own.
Despite hating the Koels for tricking the poor currawongs, and my deep disappiontment that there are no currawong babies, I cant help admiring the baby Koel. So beautiful, with long tawny tail and magnificent wings, big eagle beak and ruby red eye. Such bastards, the way they hang their heads and shuffle their wings, demanding the currawongs feed them. They are lovely, in their own way. If the currawongs manage to have some of their own babies I will totally forgive them....
Im not sure whats happening with the Burra. We used to get Missy and Fred every afternoon. Fred was the male and always looked a bit dirty, always came down first and chased off the other birds before the very prissy missy came down. A few months ago Missy vanished, but Fred was bringing down an obviously young Burra - I called him little fred. But as to Missy, I have no clue. But Fred and Little fred have been coming down, and whenever little Fred gets scared of the magpies, choughs or others, Fred would tick his tail, frown his Burra brows at his kid, and say "ook ook" as if to say, "You are the KING of the BUSH mate!" but Burras do not engage in the territory forming behaviour of magpies and choughs - ol Al the magpie, cant wait to abuse his 3 screaming children every afternoon. Yay, its time to beat up the kids! And starts kicking them around. It gets them tough. But Burras dont do it, so every after noon, Fred would just keep bringing down little Fred, getting upset when he cowered or was furtive and encouraging him to just come and eat and SCREW them other birds. They arent king of the bush!
And last night as the sun set I heard Fred start to laugh - and then he was overcome, overtaken, by the little Freds first real laugh. It started at a slow chuckle and then cracked through the gum trees like a roaring ecstasy that echoed around and around the tree spaces, silencing every other bird as they went still and listened to the sound of the new king. Now Ive heard both boys laughing - the baby Koels have made them nervous - but they are changing positions and laughing in a pattern, so together, they will be teaching the baby Koels....We may be smaller...But we're faster, we are quieter....We are right behind you! These are our trees!
The choughs spend all day around the house. We get an assortment of leaf litter around the fenceline, and the choughs spend the day going through that, looking for cat food, and going through the runoff from the back deck. Even without the choughs, I can use the bird population to monitor whats going on around the place, but with them there its like an alarm system. Anything at all happens, and the choughs cry like a car crash, "Oh! Woe!" they say. They really have the most frightening and mournful cry.
The currawongs are SO compassionate - they dont want to feed them anymore, indeed, dont want to be anywhere near them, yet they continue to return to the wide open mouths and flapping wings, trying to encourage the babies to hunt, or at least come to us for some free snacks. The Koals are stubborn, cuckoo childs, who stubbornly refuse to hunt and even droop their wings miserably in a bid to convince their foster parents they will die of starvation. The currawongs nip through the trees, swinging almost, through the tinyest of gaps and scuttling along branches. When their adopted chicks try this, they wobble in an ungainly fashion. When they try to fly, their huge wingspan fills the spaces between the woody trees, almost catching their wingtips, so they have to land again quite quickly. Both parents and children are confused at the difference of their movements. But the currawongs are desperately trying to wean them, they look so tired, so stressed. I really hope they wont be too worn out after the enfants terrible and have some of their own.
Despite hating the Koels for tricking the poor currawongs, and my deep disappiontment that there are no currawong babies, I cant help admiring the baby Koel. So beautiful, with long tawny tail and magnificent wings, big eagle beak and ruby red eye. Such bastards, the way they hang their heads and shuffle their wings, demanding the currawongs feed them. They are lovely, in their own way. If the currawongs manage to have some of their own babies I will totally forgive them....
Im not sure whats happening with the Burra. We used to get Missy and Fred every afternoon. Fred was the male and always looked a bit dirty, always came down first and chased off the other birds before the very prissy missy came down. A few months ago Missy vanished, but Fred was bringing down an obviously young Burra - I called him little fred. But as to Missy, I have no clue. But Fred and Little fred have been coming down, and whenever little Fred gets scared of the magpies, choughs or others, Fred would tick his tail, frown his Burra brows at his kid, and say "ook ook" as if to say, "You are the KING of the BUSH mate!" but Burras do not engage in the territory forming behaviour of magpies and choughs - ol Al the magpie, cant wait to abuse his 3 screaming children every afternoon. Yay, its time to beat up the kids! And starts kicking them around. It gets them tough. But Burras dont do it, so every after noon, Fred would just keep bringing down little Fred, getting upset when he cowered or was furtive and encouraging him to just come and eat and SCREW them other birds. They arent king of the bush!
And last night as the sun set I heard Fred start to laugh - and then he was overcome, overtaken, by the little Freds first real laugh. It started at a slow chuckle and then cracked through the gum trees like a roaring ecstasy that echoed around and around the tree spaces, silencing every other bird as they went still and listened to the sound of the new king. Now Ive heard both boys laughing - the baby Koels have made them nervous - but they are changing positions and laughing in a pattern, so together, they will be teaching the baby Koels....We may be smaller...But we're faster, we are quieter....We are right behind you! These are our trees!
The choughs spend all day around the house. We get an assortment of leaf litter around the fenceline, and the choughs spend the day going through that, looking for cat food, and going through the runoff from the back deck. Even without the choughs, I can use the bird population to monitor whats going on around the place, but with them there its like an alarm system. Anything at all happens, and the choughs cry like a car crash, "Oh! Woe!" they say. They really have the most frightening and mournful cry.
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