Question about Tawny Frogmouths

[martin butterfield <>]

The roost-fidelity of frogmouths is an interesting question.  In Gisela Kaplan's book on the species she comments that they rarely use the same roost for more than 4 nights in a row.  With the pair that I follow in Carwoola they have sometimes used the same roost tree for 6 or 7 nights before moving off to another.  Over the 4 years I have been following them they have used 15 different trees as daytime roosts: Some roosts have only been used once or twice but at least 6 have been used regularly.  Usually the pair snuggle together but occasionally (as today) they might use different trees, up to 100m apart.

They do tend to be faithful to a nest tree.  'My' pair have used exactly the same site for 3 years in a row and should start work on refurbishing the nest in the next 3 or 4 weeks.  When the nest is active the male will spend all day on it with the female in the general area.  I'd suggest Trish's friend might be able to locate the nest in September when they are likely to be brooding.

Martin

On Thu, Jun 16, 2011 at 2:06 PM, Philip Veerman <> wrote:

Hello Trish,

 

It may be a case of curious wording, but I can tell you with certainty, that if they are alive, unless someone is hand feeding them, they certainly would have moved every night. Maybe you are not aware that they are nocturnal. (They are not owls.) So you are seeing them in the daytime, when they return to their roost. It is fairly normal for them to be faithful to a particular roost tree. Each night they will be out hunting in the vicinity and return to their roost tree before dawn.

 

The darker one is the male and the more brown one is the female.

 

Philip

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Trish Fletcher [
Sent: Thursday, 16 June 2011 11:59 AM
To:
Subject: [canberrabirds] Question about Tawny Frogmouths

Hello Everyone,

 

I live in Cook. A friend who also lives in Cook ( Booth Crescent) has two Tawneys snuggled up together in a tree in her front yard.  They haven’t moved now for over two months – same tree, same branch. They’ve sat through neighbourhood noise, cars and people coming and going from the house, two young children playing under the tree, etc. A few weeks ago a branch near them cracked and fell, but they still didn’t move.

 

I’m hoping someone may be able to explain what is going on with them.

 

Any information or even just an educated guess would be very much appreciated to help ease our burning curiosity!

 

Many thanks,

Trish Fletcher

 

It is hard to see from this photo, but one seems to have more brown around it’s face and the other slightly blacker...?