Over the last week or so, I have spent some time around the
grassland behind Glendale Depot, Namadgi NP. On Friday, on a calm golden
morning, there were about 35 Diamond Firetails in the area, accompanied by rather
more Yellow-rumped Thornbills and about a dozen Jacky Winters. Other
birds included Scarlet and Hooded Robins. Bird numbers dropped as the
wind came up. They were low this morning with an unpleasant fresh
north-easterly.
Mentioning non-birds to this list usually excites input from
expected – and sometimes unexpected – quarters, so here goes with
this one. On Friday morning down towards Brandy Flat Hut the still air
was rent by wails of wild dogs, at least 2 or 3 with some plaintive yips suggesting
a den in the vicinity. A ranger tells me that the local ‘dogs’
have been tested and found to be 99+% genetically ‘dingo’. This
dingo approximation to the National Parliament seems remarkably close at about
45km, although I am sure others will have knowledge of closer ones, perhaps
even, one likes to think, making use of the grounds of the untenanted prime
ministerial lodge. I will say for our dingo, picnic areas aside, that it
does tend to be a beast of the semi-wilds. On the other hand, there are
probably more foxes than politicians within 3 km of the parliament, but I can’t
see any government program providing funds to enable that proposition to be
verified.
