Dancing on the Edge of the World
Everyone has a story about birds. They are all about us and are our contact point with nature. The birds I see are usually in an urban environment and so I concentrate on these in my writing. I don’t pretend to be an expert but birds of the city and suburb are also the ones that most people identify with, the species you do not need a compass and binoculars to seek out. A scarlet robin singing in a garden is just as exciting as a swift parrot in an ancient forest and is worth just as many words in my On the Wing writings, which appear weekly in the Mercury newspaper’s Weekend magazine.
By Don Knowler
The ornate room in City Hall seemed a long way from the bucolic beauty of the Waterworks Valley. And the speech I was about to deliver to a meeting of the City of Hobart’s planning committee was a long way from the arcane language of development matters. Instead of discussing discretionary uses, … [Read More...]
Filed Under: On The Wing
By Don Knowler
Birdwatchers use a term with ANZAC roots – Jizz – to identify birds that at first sight may look similar. The acronym is actually GISS (General Impression of Shape and Size) and this was a vital aid in helping the Diggers and Australian air and naval crews distinguish between Japanese planes and … [Read More...]
Filed Under: On The Wing
By Don Knowler
The New Zealand travel bubble might have started to much fanfare but for some trans-Tasman travellers it has never applied. A small shorebird from New Zealand, the double-banded plover, has not only defied travel restrictions, it has defied the laws of migration which generally sees birds travel … [Read More...]
Filed Under: On The Wing
By Don Knowler
The clocks had gone back, darkness fell earlier and all of a sudden I felt a chill in my bones, and a flock of departing summer visitors, striated pardalotes, could feel it too. As I contemplated the looming winter, the pardalotes were on their way back to the mainland, travelling as far north as … [Read More...]
Filed Under: On The Wing
By Don Knowler
A dusky robin sits on a mossy branch, with the classic upright stance that in dim light helps to distinguish the species. The dusky, as its name suggests, lacks the red or pink of the other robin species seen in Tasmania, and so I listen for another identifying feature, the soft, melancholic tune … [Read More...]
Filed Under: On The Wing
By Don Knowler
With the first glow of light in the morning sky, as the sun stirs behind the Eastern Shore, the merry chortle of the yellow-throated honeyeater starts up. Although I’m a light sleeper, I’m not troubled by the sound ringing through the treetops. And in half-sleep I listen for the emerging songs of … [Read More...]
Filed Under: On The Wing
© Donald Knowler 2018. All rights reserved.