My ex-husband and I once came across Double-barred Finches hopping in and
out of a hole in a dry creekbed, on a very hot day. This was on the way to
Borroloola (near the Gulf of Carpentaria). The hole was round and about 4
cm in diameter, and in a shaded area.
Denise
on 5/2/09 2:32 AM, Blair Wolf at wrote:
> Hi Don and Tony. This is a fairly common behavior in birds when it gets
> really hot. I have found elf owls and other small birds in the sonoran
> desert of arizona sitting in the sand at the base of large trees trying to
> find the coolest site to dump heat to. There is a short paper on the topic
> at SORA-link below. There are also accounts of larks using lizard burrows
> in the Arabian Desert to cool off and get out of the sun.
>
> http://elibrary.unm.edu/sora/search.php
>
> The Use of Thermal Refugia by Two Small Desert
>
Birds<http://elibrary.unm.edu/sora/Condor/files/issues/v098n02/p0424-p0428.pdf>
>
> (Condor: Vol. 98, No. 2, March-April, 1996)
>
> On Tue, Feb 3, 2009 at 8:53 PM, Tony Russell <> wrote:
>
>> Hi Don, I've seen Pied Honeyeaters doing the same thing just down the
>> road from Yumbarra where you got the SCPs. It was also a very hot day
>> peaking at 48C.
>>
>> Tony.
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From:
>> On Behalf Of Donald Kimball
>> Sent: Wednesday, February 04, 2009 2:17 PM
>> To:
>> Subject: [Birding-Aus] Birds and overheating - ie. how does a
>> scarletchested parrot deal with 46 deg
>>
>>
>> While having the joy of watching a male scarlet chested parrot almost at
>> my feet last week I noted a few things:
>>
>> First at 46 deg Celcius even a heat tolerant neophema like the SCP can
>> only handle so much. At the risk of this sounding a bit like a fairy
>> tale I was literally standing watching honey eaters in an area I had
>> seen the SCP days before when I caught a flutter of colorful motion.
>> It was a male SCP which flew in and landed about 5 m from me. Its body
>> feathers were tight against its body and its wings held way out from its
>> body as well. It seemed to squat for a bit then skittered toward the
>> direction of the base of a mulga. Amazingly a 2nd male SCP flew in out
>> of nowhere and proceeded to battle with the first male. They made a
>> variety of high pitched neophema like calls and then after flying at
>> each other with open beaks and skittering about chasing each other a
>> victor was declared (I couldnt tell who won to be honest)
>>
>> The victor then proceeded to a shady spot in the sand and lay there for
>> a minute. Then it proceeded to scratch and kick sand with its feet with
>> its breast sitting in the sand. Over the next few hours that I watched,
>> the bird gradually dug itself a deep enough pit all I could see was its
>> bright blue head, green back and tail. Its gorgeous scarlet chest and
>> the rest of the body hidden. It stayed like this for about 3 hours only
>> stopping occasionally to rotate its body and kick out more sand as if it
>> was regulating the very temperature of the sand.
>>
>> When it first began all of this I thought it was dust bathing. As best
>> as I can determine it was acting like an overheated canine on a hot day
>> and trying to dig where it was cool to avoid the heat.
>>
>> If anyone else has more knowledge about this behavior in neohpemas I
>> would be delighted to hear.
>>
>> Thanks!
>>
>> Don Kimball
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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