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Philip,
Many years ago (back in the lat 60's) I picked a
Zebra Finch out of a mist net adjacent to a well on the Canning Stock Route;
No.6 Pierre Springs if memory serves. The bird left red dust all over my hands
and those of my schoolmate as we undertook the ticklish task of getting it out
of the net. It was particularly entwined because a predator of some sort had
been feeding on the captives of the net. I remember it very well because there
was a bird we could not identify because it had lost most of its head and some
part of its torso at the hands of this predator and all of the other
captives had clearly struggled in fear at its presence. Usually it was
fairly simple task to unhook the birds from the net but this time it took extra
care to release the captives so embedded were they.
I can only assume that the Zebra Finch in question
had been dust bathing in the red dunes thereabouts.
I would also add that in Swaziland, I have
observed Cut-Throats dust-bathing in fields adjacent to my parent's
former house. Since they are pretty terrestrial I was not
surprised.
Cheers
Shaun Bagley
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