I call it lazy birding, sitting on a seat in the woods watching the world of nature cruise by. Let wildlife come to you. No need to work up a sweat. It’s especially rewarding in winter when we have more time to study the resident birds without feeling the need to chase and identify the migrant species.
So on the first day of the new season I chose to sit out my usual keep-fit walk in the Waterworks Reserve and perch myself on a seat fashioned from a fallen tree, a location where I usually pause just briefly to scan the trees for birds.
The seat sits at the confluence of two trails, one leading up to Gentle Annie falls and the other falling away to the Sandy Bay Rivulet, the watercourse still in its wild state before it is channelled around the reserve’s twin reservoirs.
Experiencing nature should be about slowing down – stopping, in fact. The more you remain motionless, the more you see. Nature confides when you’re not blundering through it and, ideally, the best way to observe is to sit still.
Although my focus has always been on birds, perched in one spot and taking in a great vista has opened my eyes to trees, to flowers and mushrooms, to butterflies and other insects and the changing aromas carried on the winds as the seasons pass.
Taking a break from the exercise walks, I’ve seen the stunning yellow admiral butterfly flit past on occasion, along with jewel beetles in mid-summer. And mammals, from pademelons to Bennetts wallabies, echidnas, to a dusky antechinus once, and a tiger snake.
From the seat a landscape of wattle and gum spreads out before me with an understorey of dogwood, prickly moses and blanket bush, with myriad birds flitting among them. After the summer season when exotic migrants are in focus, many local birds can appear less attractive. These include what birders call the LBJs, “the little brown jobs” – scrubwrens, Tasmanian and brown thornbills and scrubtits, with female pink and scarlet robins lacking the bright colours of the males to add to a birdwatching challenge.
Along with the mammals at this spot, these are all what I call stay-at-homes. Despite wings and swift feet, their lives will likely be lived wholly in the arena I can see from the seat.
Under the glow of soft winter sunshine on June 1, a pink robin flew towards me, settling on a branch of a dead silver wattle. It, too, appeared to relish the warm sun, and remained perched for a good five minutes, taking its time, no hurry or urgency, merely swinging its head to look about it. The bird a beauty, in crisp plumage on the breast – not pink but magenta – and smoky charcoal on the head and back.
A lazy bird, a magical sight for a lazy birder.