John,
Sure they usually nest in Eucalypts but they don’t choose particularly well shaded or hidden sites within those trees either. Another case of note, also in
Canberra, about 25 years ago, when some of the buildings in Woden town centre were being rebuilt, along the walkway between the main plaza and many buildings, a pair of Magpie-larks built their nest on bare steel scaffolding, that was being used daily by construction
workers carrying building materials and also passed by, by hundreds of people within a few metres 5 days a week, especially during lunch times (one of whom being me). The nest was about 3 metres above ground (the ground of course being concrete). The site
was also a bit of a wind tunnel and potentially very cold, although also shaded by the building, from the potentially severe summer sun. When the necessary work was finished, the contractors pulled down all the scaffolding above and beside the nest, in both
directions, leaving just enough to be stable and not harm the nest, until a week or two later when the chicks fledged, when they came back to collect the rest. The whole of the nest building and incubation period and early part of the NY period, there was
construction work going on. The workers told me that this little act of kindness cost them a lot of money in costs of extending their equipment time there. The workers collectively paid for this rather than the construction company. I also expect that even
the thousands of office staff, only some of who would have noticed the birds (even though in those days people were not buried in nonexistent mobile phones), seen it from the beginning but if they didn’t at the start, it was perfectly clear as to why some
scaffolding had been left that extra week or so just to have not disturbed the birds.
Philip
From: Birding-Aus [
On Behalf Of calyptorhynchus
Sent: Thursday, 10 September, 2020 9:09 AM
To: Canberra Birds; <>
Subject: [Birding-Aus] Magpie Lark nesting in deciduous tree
Here in suburban Canberra we have Magpie Larks nesting in a deciduous tree in our backyard.
The nest is nearing completion, but at the moment the tree has not yet put out leaves (probably will have done so in a couple of weeks).
In previous years they (or other ML pairs) have nested in tall Eucalypts nearby, this is the first year they have nested here.
My question is, why built in a tree that is as yet a bare tree. Surely they can't know it's going to leaf in a few weeks and so the shade and protection might be better than a native tree; at the moment there is no shade and no protection.
Magpies often nest in deciduous trees, but Magpies are more formidable than MLs and can fight off more predators. Has anyone ever seen MLs nesting a dead native tree?
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