An eyeful of Ibises

Straw Necked Ibis

Driving back home from Strathalbyn this afternoon my attention was caught by a huge flock of some three to four hundred Straw-necked Ibises feeding in a paddock adjacent to the highway. This is not an usual sight in the countryside around here. I am assuming they were feeding either on small insects in that field, or they had found a good source of an introduced snail. I’m sorry that I do not know which species of snail that are prevalent on farms around here. I do know that they are a pest to farmers, especially at harvest time as they can cause great problems for the harvesting machinery. They don’t do much for the quality of the wheat being reapt either. Without the ibises, the problem would be far worse.

I didn’t have my camera with me so you will have to make do with the one above. This was taken in our paddock a last year, one of the few times an Ibis has helped us get rid of those pesky snails. Still, we do not have a major problem because our Blue-tongue lizards largely keep them at reasonable levels.

Blue Tongue Lizard