G'day everyone
I have to ask if this behaviour is 'normal' for Magpie-Larks. I work in
Stuart Park, an inner suburb of Darwin. I work for a car dealership in
the service department and a pair of Magpie-Larks have taken up
residence on the roof of the workshop. The pair fly around the workshop
sitting on top of the cars and peering through the windows at the office
workers. They are cute and have been named Heckle and Jeckle by the
staff. They have 'lived' here for a couple of years now and have raised
two families. They love morning 'smoko' and lunchtime because they fly
in and grab scraps. Once they have got a bit of tucker they fly off to
the roof and shout out their alarms to keep the other birds away.
But that is not all they do - they stalk and dive bomb my boss. No one
else is bothered by them - just the boss. Whenever he sets foot outside
the office they're after him, not just the male - the females does it
too. Pecking him on his head if they get a chance. Around 5.30 pm it's
like a scene from Alfred Hitchcock's 'Birds' They set up camp on a
nearby fence that gives them a vantage point of the two doors. They
wait - patiently - for up to half an hour sometimes. As we all walk out
of the office they start to flutter around and get all excited - calling
out their warning song (war song my boss calls it) then they follow us
through the carpark, flying from car to car to fence, until we leave his
side and they dive bomb him, occasionally successfully pecking him.
They really hate him. Now we escort him to his car - joking that one
day they'll follow him home and in the middle of the night he'll hear a
beak tapping at his bedroom window!
Is this normal for these birds to single out one person - as far as he
knows he hasn't done anything to upset them? Any hints on how to stop
the behaviour?
Over to you
Sally Roddom
Birding-Aus is on the Web at
www.shc.melb.catholic.edu.au/home/birding/index.html
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message
"unsubscribe birding-aus" (no quotes, no Subject line)
to
|
