I heard a ruckus outside my place late this afternoon. The Koels were
going off. I stepped onto the street and saw a strange procession. A
female Koel was doing 100 metre radius laps. She was tailed by a
Noisy Miner (5 metres behind) with a male Koel following a further 20
metres back. After several laps, the birds settled in my backyard and
proceeded to do a duet. I would describe the female's vocalisation as
a "delta call" [as opposed to the more common "alpha" and "beta"
calls]. This was a repeated screech that reminded me of King
Parrots. The female moved into a reasonably open position in a
paperbark tree giving me good full body views. I could clearly see
that the head plumage was very different to that of the Koel I saw on
Home Island [Cocos-Keeling group] last year.
I don't recall seeing male and female Koels associating this closely.
What is the mating drill with Koels? What is the normal time lag
between mating and egg laying? Does the male "latch onto" a female
for an extended period of time so as be in position to mate shortly
before she raids a nest? There are certainly no host nests at my
place, the nearest [presumably crows] would be one hundred metres or
more away.
Regards, Laurie.
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