Farmer captures rare wildlife selfie with tawny frogmouth that flew into door of his ute

THE search for crop-damaging mice has brought together two unwitting allies – and led to a rare wildlife selfie.

Farmer Robin Schaefer managed to catch a selfie with a curious tawny frogmouth that flew into his ute. Picture: Bulla Burra

THE search for crop-damaging mice has brought together two unwitting allies – and led to a rare wildlife selfie.

Loxton farmer Robin Schaefer was working on his 10,000ha property when he came across two hungry tawny frogmouths on the lookout for mice.

The father-of-five said he was heading out at dusk to scout a lentils paddock, where the rodents were causing damage, when the birds – relatives of the owl – flew towards his ute.

One of the birds hit the door of the ute, while the other managed to avoid him and fly away.

“The poor little fellow (that flew into the door) was just huddled on the ground,” he said.

“On the front seat of my ute I had a beanie, so I snuggled it into that and it just sat there.”

Mr Schaefer said he left the ute for a few minutes and returned to find the bird partially under a seat.

“When I picked it up it seemed like it wanted to roost, so I put it on top of the seat next to me,” he said. “It was much more alert and seemed to have recovered, so I thought I’d take it back to where I found it to see if I could release it.

“When I was driving back, it decided to climb from the seat on to my shoulder.” Mr Schaefer said he took a photograph of the bird perched on his shoulder to show his children.

“I got out of the ute still with the tawny frogmouth on my shoulder and, after a couple of minutes, it got its bearings, then took off from my shoulder and flew away into the night, hopefully to keep catching the mice that were eating our crop,” he said.

“When my children saw (the selfie photograph) they laughed so hard and said, ‘Dad, you have just got to post this (on social media), it is awesome’.”

Originally published as Farmer captures rare wildlife selfie with tawny frogmouth that flew into door of his ute