canberrabirds

The uses of wires

To: <>
Subject: The uses of wires
From: "Geoffrey Dabb" <>
Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2010 11:37:49 +1100

As it’s a little wet for patrolling the woodlands, I might raise a feature of the Canberra landscape important for birds but not often recognised as such.  This is the network of WIRES in the form of power and telephone lines that

crosses and recrosses Canberra’s backyards.  Some people might regard these as a slight degradation of the view from the back deck, but if offered a choice I would keep mine.  Birds would certainly vote in favour of them.  Over the years a surprising range of species has been observed wire-sitting, so that any unfamiliar blob noticed on the wires is routinely investigated.  I have found on these wires, to mention a few:  White-bellied Cuckoo-shrike, koel, Little Corella, Sacred Kingfisher, Dollarbird, bowerbird, boobook and sparrowhawk, not to mention the odd exotic parrot and the mammals, native and otherwise, for which the wire is their own equivalent of the Gungahlin Drive Extension.  All this in an innerish suburb.  In the below I have made the wires slightly more conspicuous than they normally appear and added 2 species to illustrate the point, easily recognised as a boobook and an Australian Kraven.  

 

a Canberra garden.jpg

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