Perhaps of passing interest re Nightjars.
Some decades ago the U of Q Professor of Zoology had annual student exercises
in Lamington N. P. Each ran for several days. As an officer of the Parks
Service, I had the pleasure of assisting in a number of them. One activity
was a study of the dawn chorus. And initially there was one call that not even
the good Professor could identify. Given once only on any morning which of
course made identification extremely difficult. Eventually it was found to be
an Owlet-nightjar giving a "good-night" ("good-miorning"?) call as it retired
into its sleeping hollow. And it was a quite different call to its regular
night-time call.
Back in the 1960s, I had a somewhat similar experience. I represented the
Dept. of Forestry (then administering N Parks) on an inter-departmental
committee investigating some N P proposals on C. York Peninsula. My first trip
to that part of the world. At one stage we camped for a few days at the foot
of the McIlwraith Range - eastern side towards the southern end. At night
there was a pair of birds calling to each other quite frequently. Calls that
I'd never heard before. On a couple of nights I tried, without any success, to
find one with a spotlight.
Desperate measures were called for. I decided to get up well before dawn and
try to follow the sound until the last call, then note as best I could where it
came from, and wait for enough daylight to search for it. Turned out to be
delightfully easy: they went to the ground for the day, sleeping some 10 or 15
m apart ... and having a final little quiet conversation, totally different to
their calls during the night, before going to sleep. I waited until there was
plenty of light and had no difficulty in find the one whose location I had
noted. Obviously a nightjar. And of course easily found in bird-books to be
the Large-tailed. Immediately identifiable by anyone who has heard its
"chopping" call.
Incidentally, HANZAB gives (among other English names), Axe-bird,
Carpenter-bird, Hammer-bird, Joiner-bird, Mallet-bird and Woodcutter. And
somewhere long ago, I recall "Betting-bird" being given as yet another name.
HANZAB says the "chop" is "usually repeated 3-6 times, sometimes only once, and
once as many as 48 times, before pausing for a few seconds before another
bout". Sadly, I cannot now remember where I found the reference to
"Betting-bird" - it being claimed that men camped in the bush would bet on how
many chops there would be in the next call.
Cheers
Syd Curtis
On 28/10/2011, at 7:09 AM, Tom Tarrant wrote:
> Recently whilst analyzing audio sensors from the QUT audio project
> <http://www.mquter.qut.edu.au/Sensor/monitoring_samford.aspx>at Samford (SE
> Qld) I came across this call <http://www.aviceda.org/audio/> and believe
> that it is the daytime call of the Australian Owlet-Nightjar. I have created
> a small site to highlight 'Mystery-calls' that we are finding and you can
> leave remarks and opinions. Listen for the 4 repetitions.
>
> I have also recently found the following publication extremely useful 'The
> Sound Approach to Birding' <http://www.soundapproach.co.uk/> by Mark
> Constantine and recommend it to anyone with an interest in learning about
> bird-sound (Please note that I have no commercial interest in it.)
>
> Look forward to hearing your comments,
>
> Tom
>
> --
> ********************************
> Tom Tarrant
> Kobble Creek, Qld
>
> http://kobble.aviceda.org
>
> http://picasaweb.google.com.au/aviceda/
> ********************************
>
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