G'day all
I have looked Rockwarbler mimicry up on the Birding-Aus archives and
there is only one mention of it several years ago. Having found only
a small repetoire for Rockwarblers in the HANZAB, I felt that it may
be good to put another record of this event "out there". Perhaps
others will also feel inspired to keep an ear out for this behaviour.
Despite being an avid Rockwarbler observer for some decades, I had
not witnessed this so emphatically until last Friday. I was in
Sydney's Royal National Park in the company of a Canadian friend who
had come to Australia specifically to see this one bird(!) after
dipping on it in 2004. To her great joy (and a huge reduction in my
stress levels), we observed a pair of these very confiding birds at
very close quarters for some time, as they foraged amid moss on a
large boulder. On more than one occasion, one bird (presumably the
male) fed some small invertebrates to the other (also not recorded in
HANZAB).
On two occasions the bird which was providing the food to the other
stopped foraging and began to beautifully mimic a White-throated
Treecreeper's "warbling/trill" call - no, not like the occasionally
heard Rockwarbler "warble" - the Rockwarbler was perfectly
reproducing the discrete and loud warble which White-throated
Treecreepers make especially around this time of year. The
treecreeper was making the same call from a tree on the other side of
the trail and the calls and their volume of both birds were clearly
identical.
A number of Acanthizids possess mimicry skills to one degree or
another, but this event demonstrated to me that it is the Rockwarbler
which produces the best quality (if not quantity) of mimicry skills.
Ricki Coughlan
Cremorne Point, Sydney
http://www.redtail.net.au
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