Galahs lose their home
Galahs at nesting hollow
A few months ago I wrote about a pair of Galahs investigating a hollow in a large tree in our garden. Every day or so they would come and do a little more in the hollow. I even saw them lining the nest with fresh gum leaves. But it didn’t happen. Their happy homemaking never resulted in the happy – noisy – squawk of little ones.
In the meantime I noticed that they would come every few days, sit at the entrance and screech loudly into the hollow. This behaviour puzzled me. I wondered if some other creature – an owl perhaps – had taken up residence.
A few nights ago I found out what had happened – and I have photographic evidence of who had taken over their cosy love nest. The photos below tell the story.
Brush-tailed Possum
Brush-tailed Possum
Hooded Plovers
Hooded Plover warning sign on beach at Victor Harbor, South Australia
Early last year I took this photo of a sign on the beach front at Victor Harbor, about an hour’s drive south of Adelaide in South Australia. The message of the sign is quite clear. This beach is one of the nesting places of the rare and endangered Hooded Plover. The beach also happens to be one of the busiest in the state during the summer holidays and is even popular at most other times of the year.
Hooded Plovers are confined to coastal areas of southern NSW, Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia and parts of Western Australia. Nowhere is it common and, as the sign says, very few are left in places like the Fleurieu Peninsula south of Adelaide. The birds are small (about 19-23cm) and tubby, and their favoured habitat is broad sandy ocean beaches. The nest is a small shallow scrape in the sand where they lay 2-3 eggs.
If my memory is correct, this beach at Victor Harbor is the only place I’ve ever seen this species nesting. I was leading a large group of young children on camp when we came across a nest. Keeping 60 eager children away from the nest was a logistical nightmare. I’ve only ever seen this species on a handful of occasions, mainly on the Yorke Peninsula further west in South Australia. I have no photos of the Hooded Plover. I must try to get one when I visit the town again in about a week’s time.
Further reading:
Malleefowl mound at Tintinara
Simulated Malleefowl nest in main street of Tintinara, Sth Aust
Yesterday I wrote about the mural painted on the side of a classroom at Pinnaroo Primary School showing a Malleefowl and its nest. A few days later I visited Tintinara in the south east of South Australia. Right in the main street of the town there is a Malleefowl’s nest with two birds tending the nest.
Before local birders race off to visit this “nest”, let me assure you that it isn’t a real nest; it’s been put there to simulate a real nest. And the two birds are metal cut outs in the shape of the birds. It’s located on the lawn in front of the Art Gallery and Information Centre which happens to be the old railway station building.
The nest looks realistic and so do the birds – if you just look at the outline shape. I think it would have been improved if an artist had painted the birds in their correct colours. I guess for consistency they’ve left them just as a shape, in keeping with the metal cutouts of a shepherd, a sheepdog and some sheep across the lawn and little.
It was only a short distance to the west of here that I once saw 6 Malleefowl in ten minutes, doubling my lifetime count of this species. You can read about that incident by clicking here.
Below I’ve posted some photos of the shepherd and his sheep.
A shepherd and his sheep, Tintinara, Sth Australia
A shepherd and his sheep, Tintinara, Sth Australia
Malleefowl painting, Pinnaroo Primary School
Mural on classroom, Pinnaroo Primary School
As I was driving past the Pinnaroo Primary School recently I spotted a lovely mural painted on the wall of a classroom. The mural illustrates various aspects of the local farming activities and the environment. I’ve shown it in the photo above – click on it to enlarge.
From a birding viewpoint I was pleased to see the Malleefowl shown prominently as a part of the painting. Pinnaroo is in the heart of mallee country in South Australia.
The Malleefowl is an amazing bird unique to this part of the world and is classified as a vulnerable species in Australia. It is about 55-61cm in size (like a smallish turkey) and quietly feeds on seeds and berries in the mallee scrub, or on wheat seeds in farming areas.
The male Malleefowl builds a rather odd nest. It is a mound of dirt, leaves, sticks and bark and can be from 2 to 5 metres in diameter and up to 1.5 metres high. He will work this mound like a compost heap over the summer months, the rotting vegetation and sunlight heating up the mound. Over many months the female lays about 5 to 30 eggs in tunnels in the mound which are then covered over. The heat inside the mound is kept at almost exactly 33C throughout the incubation period which can last many months. On hatching, the young struggle through the dirt of the mound before running off through the scrub, independent from the beginning.
This species can be found nesting within 20km of my home, yet I’ve only ever seen one in the wild on a handful of occasions. One memorable occasion occurred a few years ago when I saw 6 birds in a period of 10 minutes. You can read about that encounter in an article called What kind of a duck was that? (Click here)
Below I have also included photos of two Malleefowl nests I have found in different parts of South Australia.
Malleefowl featured on a mural on classroom, Pinnaroo Primary School
Malleefowl nest, Gluepot Reserve near Waikerie, South Australia
Malleefowl nest, Ferries McDonald Conservation Park, South Australia
Emus
Emus in aviary, Pinnaroo Caravan Park
When I visited Pinnaroo in eastern South Australia last week I visited the local aviaries next to the caravan park. I’ve featured some of the birds seen over recent days. Next to the aviaries was a large enclosure containing a small flock of Emus. They cam over to the fence to see what I was up to. I ignored them as I took photos of the birds in the cages. By the time I’d finished, the Emus had lost interest in me and had wandered off.
If you look carefully in the photo above, you can see an Emu sitting under the tree on the left hand side. It looks as though this is a male sitting on eggs. The female Emu will mate with the male, select a nesting site on the ground, a rough scrape in the dirt lined with a few twigs or leaves. She will lay the 5 to 11 large green eggs and then will leave.
The male takes over the task of incubating the eggs and caring for the young for up to 18 months. Meanwhile, the female wanders off and may mate with several other males during the breeding season.
Emus can be found throughout most parts of mainland Australia, especially in pastoral and cropping lands, plains, scrublands and national parks.
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