Hi all,
With regards to Anthony’s comments
on the lack of confirmed breeding records for Koels, I recall that Birding-aus
(digest) had a record from one of its regular contributors about his visit to
friends in Canberra
and seeing a juvenile Koel last year. Sorry, I can’t remember which
digest it was and have too many other things to do at present to look for it. Wasn’t
there also a reference to a juvenile Koel on our chat line last year as well –
perhaps the same bird????? Are the wattlebirds breeding at present as most of
my records are from September onwards? It is an excellent theory though and
quite possible.
Mark
From: Overs, Anthony
(REPS) [
Sent: Thursday, 31 July 2008 9:41
AM
To: Geoffrey Dabb;
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] Koel
Geoffrey and others,
What about looking at
this record from a breeding perspective rather than food? The main host here
for them is the Red Wattlebird, and they do start breeding early. Maybe koels
are arriving earlier to catch that first wattlebird breeding attempt?
It would be brilliant to
get some confirmed koel breeding records for our patch.
Anthony
-----Original Message-----
From: Geoffrey Dabb
[
Sent: Thursday, 31 July 2008 9:01 AM
To:
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] Koel
Before we have the
annual ‘early koel’ discussion, may I recapitulate the following
from last year.
On 25 Sept Geoff
Duggan relayed a report from Yass. This led Barbara Allan to advise that
the earliest RP record was 8 Sept 1989 and that ‘there were very few
records before November’. Martin B contributed that there were
several GBS records in 2002 for the second week of October but in most other
years they were ‘a week or two later than that’.
In the same exchange
I drew attention to a report that year by Stu Harris of one in Hughes on August
11.
The usual stream of
reports began with a bird in Hawker-Macquarie-Weetangera on 25 October.
Ian’s report
may be the earliest yet, perhaps indicating a new trend, and it would be useful
to have it confirmed. Also any news of what it can find to eat at this
time of year.
Most of the above is
gleaned from the chatline archive, which exists for such purposes.
From: Ian Hodgson [
Sent: Wednesday, 30 July 2008
10:02 PM
To:
Subject: [canberrabirds] Koel
I have just rejoined the list after a 6 week holiday
absence, so don’t know what the recent sightings have been, but we heard
a koel calling last night in Weetangera. That seems very early compared with
last year, when I think we first heard it at the end of November.
Ian Hodgson
Weetangera
