city birds...

black cockatoos..

It would be good, one day, to have radio announcers not to say "We all do this" or "We don't listen". This gets my feathers bristling. Sure some "people may not do this" and some "people may do this" or are stupid. But the generalisation tends to tell us we're all morons and we'd better listen.

And one who sometimes does this annoying generalisation caper is a certain Natasha Mitchell on Life Matters, ABC Radio national.

This morning the "all people" referred to us, dumb city dwellers, who don't pay attention to birds. Bullshit. I know many people in my corner of this city of villages who actually pay more attention to birds than to other stupid animals, like humanoids with cats, or buses.

I know it's a trick of the political trade to say "everyone thinks" — our John Howard used this a lot to con us — but it's not befitting of intelligent radio presenters.

So what about birds in a city like Sydney?

It does not take long for many people to notice the bird life. From the big pelicans to the small finches, Sydney has many varieties of birds which survive despite the noise, the pollution and the @#$%^& cats. Sydney is the city of birds.

Depending on the season, you will often hear a cacophony of volubil bird songs, warnings and courtship calls. One does not need to go across to Yamericka to talk to an expert about bird noises.

There has been and are many birdsong experts in Australia, though perhaps none who created a fake raptor to startle the bird population. But this is not the point. There are enough bloodless noisy bird battles here to make you understand the bloody Middle-East conflict. Here are some of my short amateur observations:

Lorrikeets. They are noisy. it would seem overtly joyously noisy. Forty or fifty birds in a flock in a tree is very noisy. And one should be able to note the various calls, ceaseless gaggles, raucous banter and whistling. Some of the crackle will also indicate pecking order.

When in love, the partners often cuddle on a branch and babble gently like doves for several days in the same spot, day and night. They mate for life... Usually, birds of prey or carrion birds such as crows and currawongs stay clear of a NOISY flock of Lorrikeets.

The flight of the Lorrikeets is amazingly straight like green arrows with little deviation except when landing to a chosen position often designed to assert a status or claim a flower — especially that of the bottle-brush which they love the nectar of. Despite their bright colouring, they are often hard to see in trees. It seems that their plumage is designed to mimic that of the green leaves, of the red flowers and of the yellow leafy reflections of the sun.

Sulphur-crested Cockatoos. This big proud-looking ungainly white bird, according to most human ear, would have the most screeching call of all. One could think that professor cockatoo is scratching a chalk on a blackboard. In town they fly in small flocks of up to a dozen, screeching away, scratching away, and destroying things for pleasure it seems. Recently a flock of cockatoos destroyed the set of Opera in the Park... Not uncommon to have cladding of houses made of reasonably soft cedar-pine also destroyed by the "bloody cockatoos". The damage is unreal. You can try to chase them away, don't worry, they will come back in bigger numbers and eat the wipers of your car as well. Their flight is erratic. Possibly they have too much wing surface for their weight and when they fly, it seems as if they were drunk. Their beak is a powerful weapon. Their eyes are cheeky.

Black Cockatoos (see picture at top, with an A380 in the background) are rarer in town. They flock in small numbers usually a group of six maximum... They have a distinctive whistling screech. When they appear in town, it usually follows a storm up in the mountains. They appear around dusk and choose a tree where they settle for the night. By day break, they already have moved on.

Corellas could be the badass boys of the parrot family. A flock of several hundred corellas in town can destroy electric wires, cable networks and trees such as oaks. In parks that have been hosting the "Corella games", the grass is often covered in small branch cuttings that those parrots make who knows the reason for. Sharpen their sharp beak? Impress the female folk? And then they gather on the grass destroying a patch of lawn in a few minutes, looking for grubs while mucking about. Their "double"-call is distinctive like a creaky window being opened suddenly.

Seagulls pester chips-and-chips eaters on the shores of the city. If you have a picnic on a beach or a park, your choice of pests is between ants, seagulls and a smartly hidden kookaburra. Should you throw some scrap or chips to a couple of seagulls, it's likely the noise they make will attract 136 more seagulls around your blanket in three seconds flat. There are times, especially during stormy weather, when these birds venture deep inshore. According to some classification, seagulls are not so much a seabird but a scavenger that find most of its crumbs and breeding grounds near the sea. They squawk and never smile. They always appear angry to one another and pissed off with the world at large. I'm sure they blame god for something.

Terns are seabirds. They fish. They call to the world with a discreet whistle. They seem smarter but less gregarious than the common seagull. They plunge to catch the fish they spot from sky high. As soon as they emerge from the water, they have to be swift like nifty spitfires in avoiding actions against raiding seagulls trying to pinch the catch away.

Crows (Ravens). You know a small flock of crows is not far from you when you think someone is spewing their lunch in repeated chunderous squawks. Blaaahhhh.... Blaaahhhh.... I have been told by informed sources that crows the world over, originated from Australia. They are survivors. They raid nests and they eat flattened old and new road kill. Dead rats are good tucker. Of course you will see BIG crows being chased — like bombers chased by jetfighters — by three or four small birds, such as the Noisy Minors away from their territory. Not only you can see, but you can hear the distinctive calls and chunderous bothered responses in such pursuits. Feathers rarely fly, as the crows seem to know how far they can push the invasion.

Noisy Minors will ring the alarm bells to tell the bird population that a cat is approaching. All the other birds seem to take notice. When a @#$%^& cat comes along on a roof, a branch or along the pathway, the Noisy Minors bleat incessantly. It's time for you, annoying moggie lover, to go and collect your one eye-brow Ginger from the neighbour's garden. Ginger caught between a sedentary life on the bonnet of your car and the call of the wild could get hurt by a couple of large crows. Ginger usually value its life and kills an unlucky dove instead of a big rat — Rats are big enough to kill a cat. I've seen a few dead cats and they had not been hit by ongoing car traffic. Could have been a dog doing the deed but most dogs in the areas are barking pacifists.

Koels are the large cuckoo of the Australian bird population. They have the most powerful call the syntax of which is a loud "KO-EL" often repeated five time in crescendo with the last one as if carrying a question mark... Other birds chase Koels which lay their eggs in other birds nests, when no-one is looking. Lazy big birds. They let the other birds to do all the feeding and caring. They are dark grey and very difficult to spot because we could be tricked to believe they are nearby, when they could be a football length or two Olympic swimming pool lap away from us. They "ko-el" day and night in season... One needs double glazing.

Magpies are clever birds. They are very family oriented birds with various calls from melodious songs to whistles. When the young have flown the nest, they still are looked after by the adults, especially on the ground and on branches. The young still have the grey plumage though they can fly, but the adults make sure that no other bird such as crows or currawongs come near the brood. Magpies can "attack" people with black hair during the mating season.

Currawongs, a bit bigger than magpies in black (MiB), appear to be more "solitary birds" but they can be solitary in numbers of two or four. They are clever birds, the call of which is distinct to that of the magpies but one always forget the difference. Uncanny. A whistling currawong could seem like a singing maggie. I say clever bird here to define a certain aptitude of patient spacial observation, in which there is a near-certain pay off. Most birds are after grubs, seeds, nuts, grains or nectar in whichever evolution developed their tool to gather food. The beak of parrots can crack hard nuts for example but the tongue of lorrikeets is also designed to collect nectar from flowers. The beak of Currawong, crows and magpies is more like a universal grabbing squashing tool — like a pair of pliers.

Quietly, near the beaches, solitary sea-hawks skim the land from sky-high, for tucker. From high above, they can spot a lizard or a fish. Like most animal (possibly all) their eyesight needs to be 100 per cent. They can't wear glasses to compensate for poor vision. the weak bird, the sick bird and the ill-equipped bird never is, except in industrial chicken coops which can then be decimated by "bird flu". In the wild, there is no redeemable weaknesses, apart from loosing a few feathers, but not too many thereof, otherwise flight becomes an energy sapping lopsided affair. Birds look after their feathers with dedication and protect them from attackers.

Pelicans. Pelicans are BIG birds. There are many pelicans living in our cities along the Australian coast. Sydney does not escape the flock of pelicans in various strategic places from the Fish Market to the Centennial Park(land). I have seen couples of pelicans fly low in George street, above cars and trucks. Seen them also in Harris Street. Their call is slightly blubbery and deep. They need quite an effort for take-off and landing. I've observed some miscued landing with tumble due to a late gust of wind near a chosen landing spot, or another pelican moved just in front. Once in the air, pelicans will often feel for the updrafts then fly effortlessly higher and higher. Some will fly inland for hunded of kilometres to newly watered fishing ground such as Lake Eyre... Thousands of pelicans can then die off, when the water becomes too salty with evaporation for fish to survive. The pelican beak and beak pocket is a very efficient fishing net, though, like most semi-humanised animals in city environments, these birds don't mind a cheap feed from scraps as long as it's thrown out to them or abandoned in a quiet open space. They seem to eat a lot.

I will end this first part of Sydney city bird life with the Kookaburras. When you hear the laughing jackass for the first time, you could be forgiven that the call is unreal and man-made for old fashioned pirate movies with Errol Flynn. It seems as if the birds are mocking you with infectious laughter. But it's their unique way to communicate with each other. Their presence often indicate an oncoming bout of rain. As a kingfisher, the kookaburra is possibly more apt at stealing your chicken off your hand in a flyover than catching fish. A very keen eye, a very straight powerful flight path and a strong beak will do the steal in a blink of an eye. Beware.

One should say here that birds are not like planes. They have stout bodies, a neck of some length with a striking spring-like action but a short arse. No bony tail (unlike dinosaurs and most mammals). The feathers are what provide the aerodynamics at the back. A bony tail would be "too heavy" for flying.

Gus Leonisky

Your local bird expert.

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More to come:

Honeyeaters

Ducks and water fowls

Swallows/Swifts

Pigeons (various species including the endemic Crested Pigeon)

Doves

Finches

fairy penguins

Shags

Black swans (native to Western Australia but breeding-well in Sydney)

and others...

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On the city fringes of reserves and national parks:

Green parrots, Rosellas, King Parrots, Red and Black parrots...

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plus some introduced species:

Indian Minah

Merl

Ibises

By Gus Leonisky at 25 May 2015 - 4:12pm
Gus Leonisky's blog
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more sydney birds...

Blue Wrens. There was a time that there were blue wrens in the inner city... I saw them. Then people came in with cats. Semi-affluent renters with cats. @#$%^ CATS !!. It's not that the cats attacked the wrens specially, but they do attack city birds. So small birds like wrens tend to like a "buffer" between them and possible trouble. You can still see blue wrens in Country towns. They communicate with little high pitch shrieks...

Ducks and water fowls. Sydney life revolves quite a lot around water — or Shiraz if you're a drinker. But the water means the oceans, the harbour, the rivers, the ponds, the reservoirs, the estuaries... One can often see ducks fly across the city sky with a determination that would indicate knowing where they are coming from and knowing where they are going to in the shortest distance possible. Waterfowls are quite common at the Centennial Park(land).

Swallows/Swifts. These days it seems there birds tend to like living near boats. Clever. It stops the invasion from predators, and though they are not seabirds, they tend to catch more insects above the water than in the woodlands. Thus is Sydney, you're likely to notice swallows near marinas like Rose Bay and the like. They tweet to each other.

Pigeons. The native Crested Pigeon. There are too many bloody ordinary pigeons in Sydney. They roost in the beams of train bridges or road underpasses. They breed inside the awnings of shops. They breed inside cavity walls and roofs... Then there are the Crested Pigeons. They are beautiful birds with iridescent wing colours that shift from grey, earthy colours to a bright rainbow in the sun. They like to congregate and do not become a pest, though they appear in large numbers in parks. They make little conversation, unlike the lorrikeets.

Doves. Each street in Sydney's suburbs has its pair of dove. You can hear the "roucooloo" sound they make calling to each others. Not much variety in the song, but it's quite pleasant...

Finches. Quite a variety of finches or related species... Some species at night fall in summer will congregate in one single tree and make a massive high-pitched racket for a couple of hours then go quiet as if they fell asleep...

Little Fairy Penguins. There are penguins in Sydney, they are hard to see onshore as their location is secret and mostly in inaccessible cliff-base rookery but you can hear them if you pay attention on a clear day... You might even see them bob up and then dive again in search of fish, in the middle of bays. They are often in pairs and call to each partner. They would swim quite a few miles during the day. They sound a bit like wood ducks. Qwack... Qwack...

More birds to come...

By Gus Leonisky at 25 May 2015 - 5:58pm
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more birds...

Honeyeaters. They are shy birds that seem they would prefer to be in a non-city environment but for the councils that have planted plenty of native trees along suburban road. They don't like you looking at them and will move to higher branches should you just peep. They screech a bit like a rusty key turning a seized dead-lock. Yet of all the city birds, they are the best streamlined and slick with a grey-tartan like plumage. They mostly feed of the nectar from flowers but won't refuse grubs, insects and selected scraps. One must say here that all year round, there are trees in flowers in Sydney. From paperbark trees to wattles, species flower at different times and trees within species flower at different times as well. Thus there is always nectar for birds. Birds know where to go and they remember where they went with pinpoint accuracy otherwise they would not be able to find their own nest. Bees do the same.

Shags — black and black and white... "Shags" or cormorans exist all over the world. The Aussie expression "he's like a shag on a rock" is a funny way of depicting someone who is "alone"... or is not going to move until he's sure "his wings are dry" despite chaos going on around him... Unlike other birds, cormorans' feathers are not waterproof. They use this characteristic for fast and long swimming session under water. It provides them neutral buoyancy. This is why after a fishing session, they need to "dry their feathers". They do this often before flying back to their nests for one would guess that wet feathers could be heavier to fly with, like having extra cargo. Cormorans could be the link between ordinary birds and penguins. In some countries, cormorans cannot fly. Their wings are too short, naturally. In some other country, they are used by fishermen to catch fish. The fishermen tie the neck of the cormorans with a string which prevents the bird swallowing the catch. Birds are trained from a young age to perform the trick. They are allowed to swallow one fish every ten or so....

Shags catch a lot of fish and like some other birds, they swallow them whole but eventually regurgitate the "bones"... They even eat jellyfish.

The black shag is quite a big bird, while the smaller black and white seems to be "more aggressive" to me while fishing. I must admit that even after observing many shags, I have never heard a peep from them...

Black swans (native to Western Australia but breeding-well in Sydney and all over the world). The only place to see black swans in Sydney is either the zoo or the Centennial Park (lands) ponds. They honk...

On the city fringes, near reserves and national parks, there are many species of native bird from Green Parrots, Rosellas, King Parrots, Red and Black parrots and bell-birds... and many others...

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In the city and suburbs there are also introduced species such as Indian Minah, the Merl and Ibises.

The Ibises were apparently on the verge of extinction somewhere. A few breeding pairs were introduced at the Sydney zoo and now there are tens of thousands of them feeding from rubbish bins, street corners and parks everywhere in Sydney. The Ibises are large nice birds with a beak like a bent probe that they use to dig out grubs from grass. They have a small head but seem to adapt well to human city life.

This list of Sydney city birds is by no means complete but it should give a taste of what one finds in Sydney if one looks. There are "butcher birds" and willy wagtail, etc...

One should not forget also the flying foxes. They are not birds, of course, but large bats that at night time can fill the Sydney sky, once the birds have departed the space — except for the seagulls that fly all night over the lit Harbour Bridge.

lorrikeets

Lorrikeets: it seems that their plumage is designed to mimic that of the green leaves, of the red flowers and of the yellow leafy reflections of the sun with a deep-blue sky head...

There is another parrot in most leafy suburbs, in season. The Galah.. This grey and pink parrot, like most other parrot is cheeky, clever and playful... Its shriek is like a double whistling rally cry. When a flock of Galahs comes to town, one can feel that god made things beautifully — except some farmers, those who become "cocky farmers" who loose their crops to the blither parrots, galahs and others of all kinds and feathers, think god is a vengeful idiot.

By Gus Leonisky at 26 May 2015 - 8:30am
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luck...

Seagulls are well known for being the cheekiest birds in the animal kingdom. Give them half a chance and they'll stealing anything from lollipops to pizza to chips, right out of your hand.

But this seagull stole the show – the annual Llandudno Air Show, that is – when it photobombed photography student Jade Coxon's image of the world-famous Royal Air Force fighter jets, becoming an internet sensation.

The photo of the Red Arrows aerobatic display team shows eight of the nine aircraft flying in tight formation, their trademark plumes of white vapour trailing behind.

However, in place of the ninth plane is a seagull, also flying in formation – head forward, wings outstretched. It's even releasing its own stream of white vapour.

The photo has received more than 1 million views since Ms Coxon posted it online on Sunday, and sparked a heated online debate about whether it was fake, and who took it.

"Couldn't get this photo again if I tried! Seagull photobombed the air show yesterday, looks like he's one of them haha," the 18-year-old Chester University student wrote on her Facebook page on Monday.

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One has to say here that on most occasions when birds are involved, Gus shoots in movie mode. For example the picture with the three Black Cockatoos and the A380 at top had to be planned, with some luck. As the light of day was dying, by the time I would have shot the picture in still mode, the whole lot would not have time to focus, or be focused by hand, balance the light and be frame perfect. By the time I would have pressed shoot, the plane would have disappeared behind the tree.

I had been following the black cockatoos for a few seconds when I heard the plane and saw the bird fly back towards the tree. without stopping the camera, I framed the shot to capture the plane and waited for the black cockatoos to fly into it. Luck would have it that they did just that. As I use cheap pocket cameras at most times, the shots can sometimes be fuzzy, but like in the shot of a couple of cormorans fighting for a catch, it's a record of what was there to be seen. The lucky one that had caught the fish knew the other cormoran could be bothersome, so it flew off with the catch in its beak, still, escaping the possible challenge.

The picture of the corella in the tree is one in a movie where, there again, the light is very poor but the bird cuts small branches off the tree one does not knows why, while "mucking about", going upside down and up.

I have many pictures of birds and these are not the best ones, by a long shot. I sell the best ones...

pelicans

Pelicans at the fish market, Sydney

corella

cormorans

cockatoo

Cockatoo and Indian Minahs. Cockatoos use their claws to bring food up to their beak.

ibis

By Gus Leonisky at 27 May 2015 - 2:24pm
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bush birds...

An 87-year-old field recordist has been honoured for his life's work preserving the songs of birdlife and capturing the sounds of Western Australia's Aboriginal communities.

John Hutchinson has donated rare copies of his first field recordings and notes to the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia and the State Library of Western Australia (SLWA).

They were handed over at a ceremony celebrating his achievements.

SLWA chief executive Margaret Allen said the latest gift complements the collection of over 300 tapes of bird song Mr Hutchinson had already donated to the library along with his "meticulous" field notes and other published works.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-05-28/field-recordist-honoured-for-contribution/6502216

Read from top...

By Gus Leonisky at 28 May 2015 - 5:22pm
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more city birds...

hooded pigeon

crested pigeon

kookaburra

galahs in Marrickville

couple, lorrikeets...

By Gus Leonisky at 30 May 2015 - 3:00pm
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battle of Scarborough...

Life can be tough, even for birds of prey.

A lone barn owl found itself outnumbered more than a dozen to one on a crisp Perth morning at Scarborough Beach.

It swooped and soared as it was attacked by a murder of crows (Australian ravens) and a few magpies intent on running it out of the area.

Bird expert Dr Mike Bamford said the behaviour was known as "mobbing", where birds that fear they might be on the menu of a nearby predator turn the tables by going on the offensive, in force.

"Owls are particularly susceptible to this because they're easily recognised as a bird of prey, and they're not as dangerous as a falcon or an eagle or a hawk, so they're easy game to pick on," Dr Bamford said.

A barn owl is a night hunter that can snatch raven chicks from a nest, presenting a real threat.

crow

black swans

black swans in Centennial Park(lands)

seagulls spoiling wedding shots...

pigeons

By Gus Leonisky at 31 May 2015 - 7:52pm
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our city penguins in danger... UPDATED

The NPWS has mobilised a small army of rangers, wildlife experts and community volunteers to protect the endangered population as they go about the business of breeding.

Since the first dead penguin was found less than two weeks ago, 95 volunteers have been patrolling the nesting areas around the clock through thick scrub, steep terrain and pouring rain.

The little penguin population that call the coastal heath at North Head home is the last remaining colony on the NSW mainland, but its proximity to Manly's urban area left them vulnerable to attacks from dogs and foxes.

Night vision footage, necropsies carried out on the dead penguins, and the nature of the maulings all point to a single killer fox, she said.

"Foxes are well known for indiscriminately killing or mauling multiple animals at one time including penguins and other ground birds, but they can also be notoriously elusive and difficult to locate," Ms Tyas said.

The patrol area spans much of the headland including Quarantine station, Collins Beach and Store Beach.

"The scale of the operation is quite phenomenal," Ms Tyas said.

"We have people out there 24/7 basically, sitting on those penguins to make sure that they get back to the nest safely and get out safely in the morning to go and feed," she said.

But the fox preying on the North Head penguins is a particularly cunning hunter and won't take the bait left in traps.

"He's not interested in dead food if he can get live food and there's plenty of it around," said ranger Sharon Evans.

"And he's wily enough that he's not going to get in one of the traps that we've set," Ms Evans said.

"[But] we're going to protect our penguins," she said.

http://www.smh.com.au/environment/animals/manlys-little-penguin-population-under-threat-from-lone-fox-20150626-ghz0r4.html

update: Fox shot dead

"For us that was a very good result," he said.

The fox had eluded capture for almost two weeks, and had proved to be uninterested in the dead food rangers had been leaving as bait. Authorities then took a different tack, using a calling device that mimics the sound of an injured rabbit to lure the fox into shooting range.

http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/outfoxed-penguinhunting-killer-shot-dead-at-north-head-20150627-ghz8iy.html

In this line of articles about Australian city birds, here is a link to what I posted four years ago:

at the base of it all.... (read from top)

By Gus Leonisky at 28 Jun 2015 - 9:45am
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a dead bird...

Some caring person(s) took time to arrange flowers as a tribute to this little being that had lost its life...

Some people in this city are nice and care about other things than buses. The image is like a sad song:

dead lorrikeet...

By Gus Leonisky at 1 Jul 2015 - 10:32pm
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smart birds of the bush...

Australian birds have a lot to teach us about living long and happy lives according to Professor Gisela Kaplan from the Centre for Neuroscience and Animal Behaviour at the University of New England.

"There are various levels at which we've grossly underestimated the intelligence of animals," she said when speaking to ABC Central Victoria.

Professor Kaplan has studied countless birds, including her own 75-year-old galah, and said that many shared similar traits to humans.

According to her research, magpies are capable of cognitive thinking—understanding the concept of an object temporarily disappearing when playing a game of hide and seek.

"These 'people plays' are conceptually quite difficult," Professor Kaplan said.

Language is another skill, with cockatoos capable of mimicry, which she likens to the "babbling" of a baby.

"That is the first step to learning the intonations and sounds of, let's say, speech in humans or of their own song," Professor Kaplan said.

In some cases she said mimicry extended to actual functions necessary for survival.

"Some of them are past masters in deceptive behaviour, they give alarm calls of other species and the other species fly away and then they have the food source to themselves," she said.

Professor Kaplan also said birds were capable of emotions and has dedicated a whole chapter in her book to facial expressions after studying the feather positions in birds.

By Gus Leonisky at 24 Oct 2015 - 9:19am
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the quantum edge...

Birds and other animals find their way around the globe using a biological compass that detects the earth's magnetic field; but how they work has been one of science's biggest mysteries.

Studies with the European robin discovered that their compass possessed several odd features: it requires light and it detects the angle of magnetic field lines relative to the Earth's surface, rather than its direction. Scientists pointed out that these odd features only made sense if the birds were using a kind of chemical compass that utilises one of the weirdest aspects of quantum mechanics: entanglement.

This phenomenon is so weird that even Einstein - who gave us black holes and warped space-time - couldn't believe it, disparagingly calling it "spooky action at a distance", because quantum entanglement allows distant particles to remain instantaneously connected.

If the scientists were right then the robin's compass should have been disrupted by high-frequency radio waves. The physicists teamed up with ornithologists to demonstrate that the bird's compass was indeed thrown off course by the radio waves. It seems that Einstein's "spooky action" is responsible for helping to guide millions of birds, and other animals, around the globe every year.

So it seems that life really does have a vital spark; but it's quantum mechanics rather than magic. As Schrödinger predicted, life navigates a narrow stream between the classical and quantum worlds: the quantum edge.

Johnjoe McFadden is speaking at the Q3 Symposium at the University of Sydney on February 11-13.

Johnjoe McFadden is a professor of molecular genetics at the University of Surrey and co-author with Jim Al-Khalili of Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-02-08/mcfadden-it-seems-life-really-does-have-a-vital-spark/7148448

This fellow McFadden seems to be following me... I am pushing a similar barrow here and at the trinity... and on other postings.

Read from Top... And by the way, there is less and less of the classical porkies in the mix.

...

By Gus Leonisky at 8 Feb 2016 - 2:53pm
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in danger again...

The last remaining Little Penguin colony on the NSW mainland could be at risk if a tourism company's bid to change its operating conditions is approved, environmentalists and advocates say.

Mawland, which runs the Quarantine Station site at North Head in Manly, has applied for a raft of variations to its planning controls, including playing music in an outdoor area metres away from penguin nests, boosting visitor numbers and carrying out environmental audits less frequently.

The submission also includes a request to remove the NSW Parks and Wildlife Service as co-proponents of the site, which would mean that Mawland would accept primary responsibility for implementing the conditions of planning approval.

But environmentalists are concerned that such changes will threaten the endangered penguin colony, which is still struggling to recover from the loss of more than two dozen penguins killed by a fox last year.

Dr Judy Lambert, a committee member on the North Head Sanctuary Foundation, said she was concerned the proposed change to co-proponency would largely leave the care of the Little Penguin colony in the hands of a company that runs for profit with no environmental expertise. Another group, Friends of Quarantine Station, is also concerned.

"The population is threatened with extinction. They are right on the borderline of survival," said Dr Lambert. "The change to the co-proponency linked with the other proposed changes are a major concern because Mawland is first and foremost a hotel operator not an environmental manager."

By Gus Leonisky at 14 Mar 2016 - 2:35pm
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bird brains...

Some birds, especially parrots, songbirds and the entire crow family, are surprisingly intelligent - and not just compared to other birds.
Compared with some of our close relatives, these birds have twice as many neurons per gram of brain!
So what's the story behind these smart birds' brains? Dr Karl is on the case.

listen:

http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/greatmomentsinscience/2017-...

If you carefully listen to bird calls, you would notice that lorikeets have several hundred calls expressing their mood and general chatter, in a very social environment. A group of thirty to forty birds makes a racket as they flock to the nearest flowering bottlebrush trees, in cities of Australia. Warning calls, love songs, gossip, pecking order, joy, aggression can be "sensed" even by us, dumb bird-brain humans.

Read from top...

By Gus Leonisky at 20 Jul 2017 - 6:50am
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the magies...

Dr Kaplan said once a magpie knew you and judged you to be a nice person, you would have earned a friend for life.

"They will form very long friendships, like dogs," she said.

"They will introduce their young [to you] and they will be the most charming birds.

"Even during the breeding season you can come close to them because they know you'll do no harm."

http://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2017-12-11/magies-ten-things-you-didn...