Injured bird – Mallee Ringneck Parrot
Mallee Ringneck Parrot
This morning I was busy at my desk in my home office when I was startled by a sudden loud thump on the glass of the window about a metre from me.
From time to time we are used to having birds fly into the glass of our windows. Usually the bird takes a few moments to recover before flying off. While it is stunned it is sometimes possible to get good close up photos of the bird in question.
I looked out the window but couldn’t see the poor victim. Grabbing my camera I raced outside. A Mallee Ringneck parrot was on the ground a few metres from the house, sitting quietly while it recovered from the shock. I quickly took the shots on this page before leaving it in peace to recover. I checked about ten minutes later and it had flown off.
I’ve always admired these beautiful parrots, but in examining the feathers up close in the morning sunlight highlighted the amazing colours of the feathers. This species is a resident breeding bird in our garden and nearby mallee scrub. This close encounter has given me a fresh appreciation of this bird.
Mallee Ringneck Parrot
Mallee Ringneck Parrot
Road trip to Sydney
Yellow Rosella, Balranald, NSW
We have just returned from a two week road trip to Sydney. In all we covered 2840 kilometres over five days. The remaining 9 days were spent in Sydney visiting family. We had the privilege of spending most of that time with our 20 month old grandson, so there were limited opportunities for birding.
On the trip over and back I listed the birds seen or heard whenever we stopped for a break: lunch or a cuppa. Because of the vast distances we needed to cover each day, birding time was limited. I’ll be sharing some of these times here on this blog in the coming days, including a few photos taken at the time.
In all I managed to record a total of 81 species, not bad for limited opportunities. One of the highlights was the beautiful Yellow Rosella shown in the photo above. He posed beautifully for me while we were enjoying lunch at Balranald in far western New South Wales on our return journey. You can read more about this species here.
Bar-shouldered Dove
Bar-shouldered Dove, Adelaide Zoo, South Australia
Bar-shouldered Doves can be found in eastern and northern Australia. Sadly I’ve only ever seen this beautiful species in the natural environment on one occasion – nearly 30 years ago in northern NSW. I need to get out and travel a little more! The above photo was taken in a walk through aviary at the Adelaide Zoo (click the image to enlarge).
This species is found in a variety of habitats, including subtropical scrublands, eucalyptus woodlands, gorges and gullies, near creeks and swamps and even in gardens with plenty of trees. Like many other species of pigeons and doves, they make a flimsy platform of a few sticks which serves somehow as a nest.
Further reading:
- Flock Bronzewing Pigeon
- Spotted Turtledove nesting
- Peaceful dove in our garden
- Great birding moments – Crested Pigeon
Wandering Whistling-duck
Wandering Whistling Duck, Adelaide Zoo, South Australia
I have never seen a Wandering Whistling-duck in the natural environment. Sadly, I’ve never been to areas where this species lives in the wild, namely northern Western Australia, Northern Territory and eastern Queensland. One day I’ll get there – but not yet.
Instead, I have to content myself to seeing this species in captivity, such as the bird shown in the photo above, taken recently in the walk through aviary at Adelaide Zoo.
We have two whistling-duck species in Australia, the other being the Plumed Whistling-duck. They get their name from their whistling call, usually when in flight.
Their preferred habitats include lakes and swamps, flooded grasslands, the edges of rivers and dams.
Further reading: