Just returned last night from a week's work in Katoomba. In the few
passing birding moments I had, I noticed points of comparative
interest in three species:
1/ The Origma I saw was foraging on bitumen and its cement
gutter & kerbing. Nearby was a sandstone shelf, and beside that some
blocks of 'caged' landscaping rocks. Does this mean that we might, in
some places, have augmented Origma habitat, by 'cementing over'
corridors of hard ground which extrapolates in some places from their
native sandstone?
2/ Here in SEQ we are accustomed to the White-browed Scrubwren,
Sericornis frontalis laevigaster, which is pictured in the
field-guides as simply 'brighter' than the Blue Mountains'
White-browed Scrubwren, Sericornis frontalis frontalis. However,
considering some of these White-browed Scrubwrens which were foraging
along with the Origma, the two species were almost confusable, i.e.
Katoomba's White-browed Scrubwrens appeared dark and dusky -- much
more so than in the guide books, and than its SEQ cousin.
3/ Nearby again, in this same spot near the edge of the
escarpment, were some honeyeaters which it took me a while to
identify. I was quite astonished to realise they were Eastern
Spinebills (and of the same subspecies as the ones in SEQ) --
behaviourally, they seemed very different from those I'm so used to:
in Katoomba they were fluttering about and dashing by so quickly that
you couldn't focus on them, singing and twittering fantastically and
frequently; in SEQ when I have seen them, these birds are much less
mercurial, and quieter.
Cheers,
Judith.
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