My wife is a Wodonga girl and Peewee is the ne Vic name for
Magpie-lark as well as adjacent NSW. Currawongs were Jays in ne Vic as
well.
Cheers
Steve Clark
Hamilton, Vic
Sent from my iPod
> On 25 Feb 2014, at 20:43, brian fleming <> wrote:
>
> Dear Bill,
> What a delightful account your grandfather wrote.
> Tomtit is usually Yellow-rumped Thornbill - and I used to see them at
> Hay's Paddock myself, pre-freeway, say 1970, with the Flame Robins.
> Your grandfather's Sparrowhawk could be the Collared one, but just as likely
> to be Nankeen Kestrel - another I remember there.
> Diamond Sparrow is Spotted Pardalote - my Dad called them Diamond-birds.
> Plovers are now Masked Lapwings.
> Country people still say Blue Crane for White-faced Heron.
>
> I still say Spurwing Plover, and "Cranky Fan" for the Grey Fantail, because
> that is its /real/ name. And of course Mudlarks are Pewees in NSW and
> further north, and quite often Murray Magpie in SA.
>
> I know all these names because they were what I heard as a kid, and because
> I had "What Bird is That?" - gives lots of alternative and country names.
> But I bought the recent book on Australian Bird Names and I intend to go
> through C.J.Dennis's charming book of verse "The Singing Garden" with it, so
> I will know exactly what he meant by Summerbird (prob. BFCS) and Jay
> (?Currawong).
> In Broken Hill a woman told me Apostle-birds were "Lousy Jacks".
>
> Hope this is some help!
> All the best,
> Anthea Fleming
>
>
>
>> On 25/02/2014 6:46 PM, Bill Stent wrote:
>> Hi all, I was going through some old papers the other day when I found this.
>> It was written by my grandfather in 1985 about the birds of the local place
>> (I now live in his old house). He's referring to the period between the
>> wars, I'd guess, although he didn't make that plain, it's just a memoir. He
>> lived in the area between 1918 and 1992.
>>
>> My question is what are these birds? I didn't start birding until after he
>> died, so I never talked with him about them, apart from when I was a very
>> young kid "helped" him milk his cows on what is now Hays Paddock. I think I
>> know most of them, such as the Laughing Jackass, rather obvious really, but
>> what is a Tomtit? We do occasionally see Black Shouldered Kites or Collared
>> Sparrowhawks, but I have no sightings of Pallid Cuckoos.
>>
>> Bill (junior - my grandfather's name was also Bill)
>>
>> The Glass Creek area and Hays' farm used to be a veritable Eden of birdlife.
>> In the Springtime at sunrise I have counted up to 30 species of birds. The
>> Pallid Cuckoo or Brainfever Bird, so called for its plaintiff insistent
>> call, and the Laughing Jackass were prominent, as was the Butcher Bird with
>> its melodious rich notes. The Mudlarks had their mud nest in the gum tree
>> near the cow shed, the Willy Wagtails nested over the creek in the willow
>> trees, the Teal and Black Ducks were on the edge of the creek in the furze
>> bushes. The Reed Warblers, Tomtits, Goldfinches and Silvereyes were in the
>> shrubbery, not forgetting the restless little Blue Wrens with their dun
>> coloured harems. The Rosellas nested in the big gum tree near Newberry St
>> where also the Sparrow Hawk and the Blackshouldered Kite made their base.
>> The Magpies nestled in the gum trees further down. The Diamond Sparrows had
>> little burrows in the creek bank for their nest. Once I saw a tiny Chat
>> feeding a young Cuckoo about four times its size.
>>
>> The Skylarks during the day were a delight to the children. They would fly
>> singing and spiralling upwards and then suddenly, closing their wings, drop
>> silently like a stone to earth. There were also Plovers, Blue Cranes, Quail.
>> Wattle Birds, Robin Red Breasts, Crows and the occasional flock of Ibis and
>> of course the Blackbird and Thrush songsters. Colonies of little Fire Tails
>> and Bell Birds
>> still exist around the billabong at Burke Rd Bridge.
>>
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