G'day,
When I first moved to my present house we had only a few trees and shrubs,
and very few birds. We did however have Yellow and Yellow-rumped Thornbills
permanently in our yard, plus Grey Fantails visiting every winter.
Once all the reveg areas we planted (across about 5 hectares) reached a bit
of a height Singing Honeyeaters arrived and thrived, vigorously forcing all
the smaller species out to peripheral areas, like the couple of Boxthorns
and Pepper trees down the road.
Now the planted vegetation is getting up over 5 metres in some areas a very
close-nit mob of White-plumed Honeyeaters has moved in. They can stand up to
the slightly larger Singing Honeyeaters by being in a group.
This autumn for the first time Yellow-rumped Thornbills have moved back in
to the main treed area where they don't seem to be getting harrassed,
probably because rather than 4 or 5 birds there is a flock of 19 all
together.(the biggest flock I've seen here).
My guess is that now in a flock your Brown Thornbills can turn the tables on
the usually aggressive Honeyeater, I imagine it would not want attention
drawn to itself and would eventually head off.
There would be 8 or 10 Singing Honeyeaters here most days, but I rarely see
them in a group, they seem to each defend there own corner of the block. If
they ever ganged up, they'd be a real force to be reckoned with.
Signed,Simon Starr,
A bird-nut whose lost his Fantails :-(
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