Currawongs Nestlings

["Philip A. Veerman" <>]

Most of the past many years I have had Pied Currawong nests in the tree in my yard or the neighbour's. The exceptions have been when the ravens have nested there. (I prefer the latter, they don't attack me when I step out the door.) Mostly I think there has been two chicks raised. This year it looks like the first nest failed (I don't know why, perhaps predation). When the chicks might have been about 1 to 2 weeks old, the parents stopped going to the nest and about a week later started building another nest, on the other side of the same tree. This nest now has a number of young chicks. That number is at least one.

 

Philip

-----Original Message-----
From: Goldie, John <>
To: tom green <>; m("canberrabirds.org.au","canberrabirds");"> <>
Date: Wednesday, 1 December 2004 12:14
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] Currawongs Nestlings

Adding to the observations regarding the number of nestlings per Currawong nest.

 

We have 2 Pied Currawong nests in our GBS  The first nest had 2 heads poking up for food a couple of weeks ago, but I only saw one young standing in the nest last week-end.  The second nest has 2 young with heads poking up on Saturday.

 

Whether the first nest fledged both young or one of them failed part way along I can’t tell, but both nests hatched 2 young.

 

John Goldie,

Watson

 

-----Original Message-----
From: tom green [
Sent: Wednesday, 1 December 2004 9:24 AM
To:
Subject: [canberrabirds] Currawongs

 

Hi,

I was interested that there was more than 1 nestling in the broods you observed. Our local Currawongs only raised 1 fledgling in both cases, the nearby nest (used for several years) only ever had 1 little head raised for food. I thought this pair brought far fewer nestlings/birds in as food this spring. The adults would often return to the nest with only a small spider. The fledgling has been out of the nest a week now and is still entirely dependent on its parents.

 

Our local female mudlark died in the spring and was replaced in a day or two by a smaller (young?) bird. They nested a few metres below the Currawong nest with predictable results. The female seemed to be injured at that time and became progressively more damaged. She disappeared a couple of weeks ago and as yet has not been replaced. I know in winter /spring there is a large floating population of unpaired birds and I am surprised that he hasn't found a mate. Has anyone seen a group of unmated mudlarks lately?

 

Tom