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September 11 is auspicious for me not because it happens to be my birthday and the date of the infamous 9/11 terror attack on the World Trade Centre in New Year – it’s a day to watch for the arrival of our welcome swallows. They should have turned up in good number just before September 11 but any delay makes me nervous. With growing reports of the decline in bird numbers, including swallows, my birthday has also become an unofficial cut-off point in the timetable I have … [Read more...] about Nervous wait for a welcome sight

My friends and I used to play a schoolboy prank on unsuspecting passers-by in the English town where I grew up. We stood on street corners gazing and pointing skywards, to see how many people would stop and do the same thing, trying to discover what we were looking at. It proved hilarious, with groups of people huddled on street corners for no apparent reason. More than half a century on, I was doing the same thing on the corner of Collins and Queen Streets in Melbourne’s … [Read more...] about Peregrines reach for the sky in Melbourne

The excited screech of rainbow lorikeets tells me I’m on the mainland when I travel beyond Tasmania’s shores. That’s the thing about birds, they speak of time and place, each region has its special birds although the beautiful and cheerful lorikeets are more widespread than most. To my surprise, though, in recent months I’ve discovered that you do not need to visit the mainland for the rainbow lorikeet experience. Walking across Sandown Park in Lower Sandy Bay recently the … [Read more...] about No joy in this rainbow connection

Imagine completing a long-haul flight to the other side of the world and returning to find you have lost your home. Jet-lagged and exhausted, you have nowhere to sleep or rustle up a meal. This is the reality for increasing numbers of migratory birds who arrive at their breeding grounds to find them destroyed by agricultural, industrial and housing development or pollution. Hazards from human development also mean many birds are killed in collisions with buildings and … [Read more...] about Long-haul shorebird flight to uncertainty

Using the lexicon of the Swinging Sixties, I was determined not to be considered “square” in my teens. My childhood passion for birds had taken a backseat in my later teenage years when the Beatles and girls entered my environment. “Square” represented the opposite of “groovy” when the Fab Four entered the fray but more than half a century on, with birds at centre stage, the term has taken on a new meaning. This has absolutely nothing to do with music. In an age where I am … [Read more...] about Hip to be square in bird-friendly garden