Tony, that's very interesting to me. We have had semi-tame Grey
Butcherbirds around our house for years, and the breeding pair is fairly
tame, but the youngsters are always more flighty, because we seldom give
them food. They use our house as a shelter in the incessant showers of
the wet season, and seem to tolerate us fairly well as we have meals on
the open verandah.
But in all those years, I have never differentiated between the calls by
gender. I am familiar with a range of their calls. There is one call
which always yields (for me) a snake or a possum: it's the kerr-kerr
call advising of danger.
As for separating gender by plumage, I have been wary of that, because I
have noticed that the plumage colour changes considerably during the
year, due to feather wear. I must pay closer attention. In fact I have
always picked out our male by his individual plumage characteristic of a
little more black at the collar. I very much doubt that it's
characteristic of all males.
But what I can't figure out is how you can tell a young bird by gender,
or have you seen them practising? Come to think of it, I can't remember
anymore how I came to work out which of our adults was which gender.
Cheers,
Jill
Jill Dening
Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Australia
26° 51' 41"S 152° 56' 00"E
On 22/01/2011 8:11 AM, Tony Keene wrote:
Hi all,
My wife has been observing a family of Grey Butcherbirds around our building
for a few weeks (which has been great fun for the kids as they're quite tame).
We don't know if it's the same for all GB families, but the ones round ours
have distinct male and female calls that make a moderately complex call and
response with each doing a couple of different phrases in turn. The adults are
more wary of us, but the chicks (one from this year and one form last) are very
tame and the youngest one flies to our balcony when my wife goes out and greets
her with a double bob of its head. This bird is starting to find its voice and
does the male's call, while the older chick does the female call. The youngest
one is still quite scratchy and the notes are a bit off, but is improving. My
wife's a good mimic of Grey Butcherbirds and if she whistles the male call, the
young female responds until she works out where it's coming from. The young
male will often sing with her for a few minute
s in
return for a small piece of cheese (they only get one small piece a day - no
question of reliance as a) it's only a small piece and b) even when cheese is
offered, if an insect flies past, they'll ditch the cheese in favour of the
insect). Jo was taking some photos of the young male and when she moved the
camera round to take portrait shots, he craned his neck so his head was on its
side until she righted the camera again. They're quite a set of characters.
The big four field guides don't make any mention of gender and calls and
they're not even that clear on differentiating gender: Simpson and Day and
Pizzey and Knight mention the difference between males and females, but
Morcombe and Slater indicate all adults look the same.
Cheers,
Tony
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