Thanks Virginia - I enjoyed that but it won’t go through to the list because the image is too large.
A connection with the koels is that both species are expanding locally, the common element being that both are fruit eaters. The bowerbirds make use of a variety
of garden fruits – apart from prunus, figs, mulberries, grapes etc the bowerbirds take berries from viburnum species, lilly pilly (and the Chinese Pistacio is coming on now) and also like some vegetables. I suppose they need a wider range of stuff because
they are here year-round, and when they are roaming for new food sources people want to know what that ‘strange new green bird’ is. g
From: Virginia Abernathy [
Sent: Thursday, 18 February 2016 4:23 PM
To: Geoffrey Dabb;
Subject: Re: [canberrabirds] SPRITE - not a commercial promotion
Very cute, Geoffrey. Earlier this year my field assistant, Remi, and I decided to mess with a male bower bird in the Blue Mountains by placing one of my blue model eggs
in front of him. He took the bait and placed it right in the middle of his bower (see attached).
Virginia
From: Geoffrey Dabb <>
Sent: 18 February 2016 10:43
To:
Subject: [canberrabirds] SPRITE - not a commercial promotion
Suburban garden, Narrabundah, this morning
