Henry Griggs Rambling Home Home Recent Topics Visit to Australia 2002 Sydney house 2002 Circular Quay 2004 Circular Quay 2002 Centrepoint Tower 2004 Oz Birds 2004 Oz Birds 2002 Bridge Climb 2002 Popular Topics Gallbladder removal Photo of the day HP Calculators Linux/Slackware notes Ripping/burning CDROMs Geek Alaska 2003 UK in 2003 Geek Caribbean 2002 Main Topics Anne Anne's Crafts Cats Collecting Commentary Credits Events Films Links Linux Michelle Miscellaneous Me Photo Of The Day Rachael Site Index Travel Us Want List Work Navigation Site Map

Birds from the Australian Trip 2002 [Travel] March 2002 March 2002, we went back home to Australia. We stayed with Anne's Mum, Evelyn. Evelyn feeds the birds. She's made friends with the birds and has a regular clientele that visit her most days. When we stayed there, we were slowly adapting to Australian time so we would wake early in the morning and have nothing to do except go outside and watch the birds coming round for breakfast. It often starts with a family of magpies that come calling. The magpies were friendly and stalked all over the place. When we lived in Sydney, we would occasionally get small flocks of the rainbow lorikeets come screaming round and sit in the bushes and shriek and yell. Evelyn said she occasionally got some, but not regularly. And Evelyn had a pair of crested pigeons that came calling regularly. They look much prettier than the usual vermin pigeon, with lovely colouring and fine crest on top. The heads have the same pigeon-jerk when they walk. Currawongs come calling too, but Evelyn doesn't like them much. They tend to be aggressive, so she's aggressive back with a large water pistol to keep them at bay while the other smaller birds are eating. The birds that interested me the most were the kookaburras. I've never seen kookaburras up this close before. Evelyn has a pair of adults and their latest clutch of babies. The babies are pretty big now, if you ask me. They are quite friendly with Evelyn and will sometimes feed from her hand. This is a more traditional photo of a kookaburra, in a setting I am very familiar with. The aloof kookaburra outlined against the sky. But here's a sight I never thought to see. The kookaburra family is all here, and squabbling and yarping to themselves and keeping an eye on that currawong in the background. I managed to catch one kookaburra in mid-flight. Here's a little Australian Noisy Miner bird, perky and friendly. He's not related to the Indian mynah birds, which I don't like. On my last day in Sydney, as I was almost fully adjusted to Australian sleep patterns, I was woken up by a knocking at the back door. I opened the back door and this magpie was there, knocking on the door and expecting a feed. I got it a little mince and gave it a feed.