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ok,
I've got a story. Some of you may have heard it before.
At my
old house in Hackett I had a resident pair of Magpie Larks. The birds would
forage in the yard. My wife and I couldn't really get too close to
them if we went outside. They would fly off if we got even remotely close to
them.
I had
a mist net set up in the back yard and I was attempting to repair it, an
extremely tedious exercise. I'd been there for some time when the female Magpie
Lark landed some distance away from me in the yard and began to wander about
feeding on bugs. After a while she flew off, but went straight into the net I
was working on. I got her out of the net, and she shrieked a bit which is
not unusal. I had a quick look at her and noticed that she had a wounded foot.
Closer examination revelaed that she had a long piece of cotton wound around her
foot many times and it was cutting in causing bleeding. My wife came out to give
me a hand. She held the bird while I carefully unwound the cotton from the foot.
Took probably five minutes to get it off. The whole time I was working on the
foot the bird was silent. Once the foot was clear of cotton we let her go and
she flew off.
Several times soon after that day the female Magpie Lark would land in
the back yard and walk around me foraging. She would get so close I could have
easily reached down and touched her. I reckon she recognised that I had helped
her and that I wasn't a threat to her.
Anthony
Yes,
I'm not quite the birdo-extraordinaire that my brother is but it's good to see I
have one up on him in the seagull-retrieval department!
I've
put in my two-bob's worth but I'm hoping there is enough impetus for others
to keep the discussion rolling along. It would be interesting to see if
anyone else has experienced a similar situation where a bird has surprised
them for some reason (dive-bombing magpies and plovers not included).
Maurits
Zwankhuizen
Maurits - I hope you're not seeking to close off this
discussion. It's Godzilla versus the Sceptics Society, Round 11, both
looking fresh, but neither likely to land a knock-out punch at this
stage.
Incidentally, the exploits of you and your brother are most
entertaining, even if I sometimes do confuse you. In the interests of
removing confusion I have prepared the following, and perhaps you would be
good enough to correct any errors?
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