Trivia note – with acknowledgment to Ted Wolfers …
From: Geoffrey Dabb [
Sent: Saturday, 14 July 2012 10:33 AM
To: 'Denis Wilson'; 'boy nature'
Cc:
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] FW: Double-barred Finches
Perceptions of what kind of vegetation attracts bird species are interesting, along with questions about the effect of changes. If the ANBG site before its development resembled the rest of Black Mountain there would have been no double-bars there. Perhaps the height of the site’s attraction to finches was just after the lawn seed was laid down. Flocks of red-brows, perhaps of 20 or so, still feed on the seeding lawns, and build nests nearby. I remember the large flocks of Grey-headed Mannikins that were common on the infrequently mown, perhaps roughly sarifed, lawns around Port Moresby. “What are those little birds that look like rain?”, people would ask. Probably no lawns now, or finches - maybe at the golf course.
