Silvereye and Spotted Pardalote

I had another close encounter with one of the resident birds in our home garden this morning.

I had just finished watching a long parade of birds coming to either drink from our bird baths, or to have an early morning splash before a warm day. The various visitors had quite depleted the water, so it was time to get a bucket of water from the rainwater tank and then clean and refill the bird baths.

After cleaning the containers I went to fill them up again with fresh water but was distracted by a little Spotted Pardalote coming in for a drink. It gradually approached closer and closer until it was about 50cm away from me. It watched me intently for about ten seconds, obviously waiting for me to refill the bird baths.

I love these close encounters. Pity I didn’t have my camera with me – the photo above was taken some time ago and also shows another regular visitor to our garden, a Silvereye.

Other species seen while having breakfast include:

• Brown-headed honeyeaters
• Red Wattlebirds
• New Holland honeyeaters
• Spotted Turtledove
• Crested pigeon
• Australian Magpie
• House sparrow
• Striated Pardalote
• Yellow thornbill