birding-aus

brown honeyeaters and hair

To:
Subject: brown honeyeaters and hair
From: (Shane Raidal)
Date: Mon, 23 Sep 1996 15:21:32 +0800
During a visit to Currumbin Sanctuary (Gold Coast, Queensland) yesterday two 
very inquisitive captive brown honeyeaters were behaving somewhat unusually. 
 The birds landed on the cage front or perches at a very close distance to 
my face.  Initially I thought this may have been due to socialisation or 
hand-rearing but then I remembered from postings to birding-aus that wild 
honeyeaters have been known to use fresh human hair as nest material. When I 
mentioned this, my companion thought that I was fibbing. So I placed my head 
against the wire (I was told how stupid this appeared) and sure enough both 
birds tugged out some hair which they carried back to the rear of the cages 
where I presume nest construction was under way. 
_________________________________________________

Dr Shane Raidal BVSc PhD MACVSc (Avian Health)
Lecturer in Veterinary Pathology
School of Veterinary Studies                
Murdoch University                      phone:  +61 9 360 2418
Perth,WA, 6150                                     fax:  +61 9 310 4144  
Australia                                  
_________________________________________________

<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>
  • brown honeyeaters and hair, Shane Raidal <=
Admin

The University of NSW School of Computer and Engineering takes no responsibility for the contents of this archive. It is purely a compilation of material sent by many people to the birding-aus mailing list. It has not been checked for accuracy nor its content verified in any way. If you wish to get material removed from the archive or have other queries about the archive e-mail Andrew Taylor at this address: andrewt@cse.unsw.EDU.AU