Flock around the clock
In the course of NSW lockdown, I’ve been enjoying the company of strangers, at least of the avian variety.
In the course of NSW lockdown, I’ve been enjoying the company of strangers, at least of the avian variety. When birds congregate in our semi-bushland garden, I like to think of it as flockdown. It’s busiest late afternoon, when you’d expect birds to be flying off to wherever birds go.
There’s a swarm of sulphur-crested cockatoos that arrive amid much bossy squawking and proceed to sharpen their beaks on the timber garden furniture and then have a good old nibble before bedtime. They’ve practically demolished a chair and a half this month.
The relatively sedate rainbow lorikeets show up around the same time in a gorgeous flurry of green and blue and orange and the cockatoos raise their punk rocker mohawks and give the evil eye. The Indian myna gangs will be flapping around, screeching and jostling the lorikeets aside and cornering the food. Watch bird behaviour for even just a short time and the term pecking order makes absolute sense.
We’re seeing fewer kookaburras so far this spring but when they do live up to their “bushman’s alarm clock” reputation and cackle madly at 5am, it’s not always a welcome wake-up call. However, they are helpful in seeing off the bush turkeys that cavort on our corrugated iron roof, clattering around so briskly that the eucalypt leaves shiver and our bamboo glade not so much whispers as goes into convulsions. The magpies are around as well, their melodious calls at strange odds with their plain appearance.
There’s flockdown at the nearby bay, too, where cartoonish pelicans land on the water like seaplanes skimming to a stop. At least these big-bellied birds are safety-conscious, unlike the glossy male mallards and their dowdy missuses that roam up and down the streets, courting death by suddenly crossing without looking left or right. But we locals know all about their lack of road sense and so drive at almost minus kilometres an hour, just in case. Time’s no issue. There are endless hours to duck out and go nowhere much these days.
I am waiting for the king parrots to make their seasonal visit. They are the colours of Christmas, all red and green and glossy, and always in a mated pair, the chaps with their triumphant hues and the gals a minimalist but cheering shade of lime. There’s a particular acacia bush they love and we are keeping it very spruce and tidy, like a fine buffet awaiting their regal arrival. The king parrots always stay apart from the other birds chez nous, confirming they were clear experts at social distancing before it was a thing.
