Re: ANU Superbs

[David Rees <>]

Superbs in the area to our north were known to feed on grain which had leaked out of trucks onto the road at harvest, only to put themselves at risk of being collected by passing cars.  I recall in the past some community awareness program to try and prevent this happening in the region> Given some of the old crocks used by farmers on temporary harvest permits this was likely to be a problem.  It may be less of an issue now as deliveries to silos these days are more often done by haulage contractors with modern vehicles which spill much less.  The old ones were an OHS risk to staff at recieval points and/or were not very compatible with modern recieval equipment and were discouraged.  Mind you what some farmers still do with grain stored/moved on-farm is anyone's guess.

David

On Sat, Jan 26, 2019 at 5:50 PM Philip Veerman <> wrote:

From mid 1980s & 1990s I did many road trips in the vicinity of Yass, Boorowa, Harden, Young, Cowra, Grenfell, etc. I was always in the process of going to or returning from somewhere further, so did not often do random stops. The Superb Parrots was always one to look out for and maybe found at all on half to a third of such travels. The most likely way to see them (whilst driving) was small flying flocks or the birds on the ground near the road edge, presumably feeding there. That is obviously related to the ease of finding them that way as much better than seeing them in trees. I also recall being very pleased to find them once, at a rest stop near Murrumbateman. They clearly have expanded their range toward us.

 

Philip

 

From: Martin Butterfield [
Sent: Saturday, 26 January, 2019 12:24 PM
To: COG List
Subject: [canberrabirds] Re: ANU Superbs

 

In my blogpost I expressed my initial surprise at the birds feeding on the ground.  That was because in my observations of the birds in Canberra (mainly AIS or Mount Rogers) I had always seen seen them up in the trees (presumably feeding on lerp).  I commented that Forshaw describes them as often feeding on the ground.  

 

On further thought I recalled that when the species first appeared in Canberra the wider debate included the problems experienced in their core range around Boorowa, of the birds being killed while feeding on grain spilt on the roads by agricultural trucks.  So ground feeding is not at all unusual.  (I would note that, like red-rumps, for such brightly coloured birds they can be well camouflaged if the grass is at all long.)

 

Martin Butterfield

http://franmart.blogspot.com.au/

 

 

On Fri, 25 Jan 2019 at 13:14, Martin Butterfield <> wrote:

Kevin Windle was king enough to show me the Superb Parrots around the Coombs Building at ANU this morning.  We estimated that we saw 40 birds in our lap of the building, although they were very mobile and not easy to count.  I have put a few photos in a blog post.

 

Martin Butterfield

http://franmart.blogspot.com.au/