Emu at Adelaide Zoo
Emu and Tammar Wallaby, Adelaide Zoo
Adelaide Zoo in South Australia is one of my favourite zoos, and it is also my home zoo, being less than an hour’s drive from my home. I am a life member of Zoos SA, mainly because of my love of birds and animals but also because of the zoo’s excellent conservation programmes.
Adelaide Zoo boasts an excellent collection of Australian bird species as well as a few foreign birds. There are several walk through aviaries which I always visit because they provide an excellent opportunity for bird photography. There are numerous other aviaries too, but shooting through the wire of each cage can be challenging. More about that in future articles here.
I didn’t have any such problems taking photos of the Emus in their enclosure. They roam around a large enclosure with only a low fence surrounding it. This provides excellent opportunities for good photos. They also share the enclosure with some Tammar Wallabies. In the last photo you can see a wallaby with a joey poking his head out of the pouch to pose for me.
Further reading:
- Giant Pandas at Adelaide Zoo
- Birds of Adelaide Zoo
- Eclectus Parrots, Adelaide Zoo
- Emus at Monarto Zoo
Emu and Tammar Wallaby, Adelaide Zoo
Tammar Wallaby, Adelaide Zoo
Cockatiel
Cockatiel parrot in aviary, Pinnaroo Caravan Park
The Cockatiel parrot is a species of the drier parts of Australia. It is an attractive bird despite its generally grey appearance. The highlight is the pale yellow face and crest and its distinctive orange ear patch in the male; the female being paler and greyer on the head. It is a bird of the open plains, open scrublands and woodlands and where cereal crops are grown.
The Cockatiel is a very popular cage bird. I can remember having one in a cage when I was a child. It will mimic the human voice and can be taught to say a few words.
I have recorded this species in our garden on a number of occasions over the years but it is by no means common here. Over the last month, however, I have seen and heard a solitary bird in the mallee scrub at the back of our house. I haven’t managed a photo of it yet. I suspect it is an escaped bird from someone’s aviary as it allows me to approach to within a few metres before flying off a short distance. Our neighbour has had several of this species in her aviary but I haven’t had a chance to ask her whether it’s her bird or not.
A flying visit from a Budgerigar
No Comments »21st December, 2010; Category: Aviaries, Bird Behaviour, Garden birds, Parrots and Lorikeets
Budgerigar
I has been quite a while since my last post here, and I certainly haven’t posted much in recent months. I’ve been very busy completing my thesis paper for my Master of Arts (Creative Writing). That’s now done and dusted, printed and bound and sent off to the examiners. You can read all about the journey – and how I went about writing my children’s novel here.
The week before last I took a short break from my writing and sat outside with a refreshing coffee. I needed to clear my head from all that editing, proofreading and rewriting on my book. I’d only just sat down and a brilliant flash of green landed in a tree in our back garden, just a few metres from where I sat enjoying my cuppa.
A solitary Budgerigar parrot had come to visit. Over 26 years living in the same house, this was only the second time we’d had a wild budgie in our garden. They are far more common much further north than where we live. Sadly, it was but a flying visit. It gave a couple of hearty chirps and flew off. It hasn’t been back.
There is some chance that it could have been an escaped bird from someone’s aviary; this species is commonly kept as a pet. It’s behaviour suggested otherwise – it was very nervous and flew off quickly, even when I whistled to attract its attention. Still, a flying visit is better than no visit at all.
And it’s certainly better than missing it completely while stuck in front of my computer.
Good birding.
Further reading:
Eclectus Parrots, Adelaide Zoo
Eclectus Parrot (female), Adelaide Zoo
The Eclectus Parrot of northern Cape York Peninsula in Queensland would have to be one of our most amazing birds here in Australia. Not only are they strikingly colourful as shown in the photos on this post, they are also rather unusual in the bird kingdom. The female is far more colourful than the male.
This species of bird I have yet to see in their natural environment. All the birds I have seen have been in aviaries or zoos. The photos on this page were taken in the walk through aviary at the Adelaide Zoo. In this aviary they are quite tame and therefore easy to photograph. I dare say that it will be a lot more challenging to get a good photo of one in the wild.
This species is also kept extensively in captivity, but it takes a very deep pocket to buy a breeding pair.
Eclectus Parrot (male), Adelaide Zoo
Black-winged Stilt, Adelaide Zoo
Black-winged Stilt, Adelaide Zoo
One of the benefits of visiting zoos like the Adelaide Zoo here in South Australia is to observe many bird species up close. Most zoos have collections of birds and Adelaide Zoo is no exception. There is a large collection of easily viewed aviaries decorated to reflect the different habitats present in Australia – from the deserts through to rainforests. In most cases the observer can get to within a metre or two of the birds which helps in learning the finer details of plumage.
The zoo also has two walk through aviaries where you can get even closer to the birds. These are also excellent for bird photography. One of the species I photographed on my last visit was the Black-winged Stilt shown on the photos above and below. This was a challenge – even with a flash on my camera. It was lurking in the pools of the rainforest aviary.
Black-winged stilts are water birds found throughout most of Australia where suitable habitat exists, except, of course, for the drier inland regions. They can occur in small groups of only four or five through to large concentrations in the hundreds, depending on the conditions.
Further reading:
- Zoo Chat Forums – my son’s site discussing nearly 1000 zoos from around the world. Numerous photos too.
- Favourite birding spot – St Kilda
- Water birds at Monarto Zoo
Black-winged Stilt, Adelaide Zoo