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Hi Barbara!
I was wondering if it could have possibly have been a young Koel as these are a quite a bit lighter than the adult hen and are silent except for the begging call. I've seen 2 or 3 of them on the ground after chasing moths or whatever and tiring themselves out in a clumsy prolonged effort to catch it. They can sit there for a quite a while until they, or some other circumstances deem it's time to move on. That circumstance is usually a Red WB or some other bird objecting to their presence. Just in case, I want you to put in a form to the rarities committee of a possible breeding record of the now famous "Page" Koel"
Cheers
Bob Rusk
PS I wonder if it was maybe that sculking "Scullin" Koel's progeny
-------Original Message-------
From:
Date: 1/01/2009 8:51:35 PM
To:
Subject: [canberrabirds] a good start to 2009
While walking the dog this morning I was more than surprised to see a female koel on the ground no more than two metres from me in the little park at the western end of Hannaford Street (Page). At first I wondered if she was injured but after a couple of minutes she flew off strongly to a liquidamber on the other side of the park. Silent the whole time. While the local Page/Scullin male koel (he of the stutter) wasn?t calling at the time, he has been, on and off, since. Interestingly, the female was of the pale form shown in HANZAB, while all other female koels I?ve seen have been the dark form. Any comments on how usual it is to see koels on the ground (I never have before). Or the ratio of pale to dark females? b
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