On The Wing

On the choppy waters of the bigger of the two reservoirs of the Waterworks Reserve I could see a tiny, rounded shape bobbing among the waves. Although I didn’t have my binoculars with me, I knew immediately what the bird was. An Australasian grebe had arrived on southerly winds overnight. The grebe – dwarfed by the black and wood ducks on the wide expanse of water – cut a solitary figure, looking exposed, and I wondered how long it would remain before moving on to its usual … [Read more...] about Solitary grebe rides the waves

It’s a battle of wits between a heron and a school of whitebait in the shallow waters of Cornelian Bay. A contest in which two lifeforms compete using their mental abilities and quick thinking to gain an advantage, to win, or lose. For the fish, it’s just being wary, a matter of life or death. With the white-faced heron, it emphasises intellectual prowess, strategic thinking, and the ability to react quickly and cleverly to a given situation. Most importantly, the shrewd … [Read more...] about Heron makes a meal of science

There’s hidden beauty in the bottlebrushes. The crescent honeyeaters have arrived from their breeding grounds in the high country and the only evidence of their presence in my garden is the familiar “e-gypt, e-gypt” call I start to hear from early autumn. The “crescents” usually tend to be eclipsed by the more aggressive new holland honeyeaters in the suburban environment. and they can easily be mistaken for the bigger family member because they both show striking yellow … [Read more...] about Crescent honeyeaters emerge from the shadows

“There’s something going on, I could just feel it in the air.” A Bob Dylan song was playing on the car radio as I drove into the foothills of kunanyi/Mt Wellington for a day’s birding. I could certainly feel something in the air, not the impending drama in the song Lily. Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts, more the change in the seasons. Autumn had arrived but you would never know it by the hot, sultry day. An Indian summer had enveloped southern Tasmania and the birds where … [Read more...] about The seasons are a-changing

The magpie wasn’t slow in coming forward, as the expression goes. It tapped on the window of a friend’s home, demanding to be fed. I was in magpie mode on a trip to Launceston. The species might be common across both farm and suburb in Tasmania but they are absent from my neighbourhood in Hobart. Magpies like open, drier country and the wet forests towering over my home in the Waterworks Valley are clearly not to their liking. Not so the bucolic Tamar Valley north of … [Read more...] about Magpies separate friend from foe