Folks,
A couple of notes which may be of interest:
Brush Cuckoo - between Christmas and New Year, Grassy Creek valley,
Angahook-Lorne State Park (about 10 km north-east of Lorne). Plenty of
other "standard" Otways birds - Gang-gang & Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos,
King Parrots, Rufous Bristlebirds, Wedge-tailed Eagle (3 together -
presumably a family), Peregrine Falcon (also three together, practising
aerobatics over the sea), Rufous Fantail.
Pair of Grey Currawongs around home twice in the past week (Syndal, eastern
suburb of Melbourne) - any Currawongs around here are usually Pied, and
usually in autumn or early spring.
Little Lorikeets - At least a couple near home yesterday, calling
relatively softly and feeding in a flowering eucalypt. Rainbows and Musks
are common, but the smaller ones much less so. I wouldn't bet against the
poossibility of there being Purple-crowned around also.
Life of Birds - Apropos of the recent thread about the Lyrebirds, the
decision to show a bird mimicking mechanical sounds may have been to enable
people at large to appreciate the accuracy of the imitation. You don't
need to be a south-eastern Australian birdo to recognise the imitations of
cameras (with and without motor-drives) and car alarms, but the calls of
most of the other birds which Lyrebirds can imitate so brilliantly would be
unrecognisable in the original to most viewers around the world, so the
bird's mastery of mimicry would have to be taken on faith rather than
convincingly demonstrated. Just a thought.
Regards to all.
Jack
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