Hi Birders
Funny thing coincidences. There is an article in February's Bird Observer
which I happened to pick up last night, on just this feeding technique. A
Victoria's Riflebird seen by Len Robinson of Carnegie, Victoria, in Kuranda
State Forest, N.Queensland some years ago, to quote, if Len will forgive
me "...observed at very close range a female Victoria' Riflebird as she
removed loose bark from off the trunk of a dead tree....... she alighted on
a tall dead tree-trunk some six metres from me.... she was flipping pieces
of bark from off the tree trunk and I thought she was placing her bill
under the loose bark and wrenching it away. ..... " but "Her closed bill
was manoeuvred under the edge of the loose bark so that the underside of
the lower mandible was always against the trunk. Then the bill was opened
so that the leverage created... was used as a pair of opening pincers,
caused the bark to be raised from the trunk until it broke and fell..."
A good description of zirkelning
Penny Drake-Brockman, Examination Recitals Co-ordinator, Sydney
Conservatorium of Music.
Tel: 02 9351 1254.
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