Birds in 2019

Over several years I have amused myself by composing a birdy Christmas card. Appended is a reduced version of this year’s offering. With the exception of the Little Bittern (from 30 Dec 2018) all were snapped around Canberra this year. It occurs to me that there can be nowhere else that such a . . . → Read More: Birds in 2019

Shrike-tit split

BA follows HBW/BLI which accepts the very obvious split. They should never have been lumped.

IOC has recently made shriketits a monotypic family, but I guess it is waiting for someone to publish a paper before they make the split into three species.

_________________________________________________________________ Frank O’Connor Birding WA birdingwa.iinet.net.au Phone : (08) 9386 5694 Email . . . → Read More: Shrike-tit split

Pacific Swifts along the Barcoo river, CWQ

Mike and Birding Aus'ers, An incidental observation of an estimated 6 Pacific Swifts made by Andrew Ley and myself on 9th December at 6.30am along the Barcoo River at Welford NP (143º 11 and 25º 11) – they were 'sallying' up and down the river for some several minutes There's some confusion around 'incidental . . . → Read More: Pacific Swifts along the Barcoo river, CWQ

White-throated Needletail – Byron Bay

Around 30 White-throated Needletail at the Cape Byron Lighthouse this am after a thunderstorm last night. Cheers Steve Potter

— Steve Potter0407397234

Birding-Aus Digest, Vol 74, Issue 5

Re Shrike-tit split.

Hi Dave, The split into Eastern, Western and Northern Shrike-tits has been mooted for decades based on distribution and colour differences, the latter are minor but definite. Why Birdlife has split them is questionable. The split makes it harder for twitchers, the Northern form has eluded us on many visits but is . . . → Read More: Birding-Aus Digest, Vol 74, Issue 5

Shrike-tit split

I discovered a few days ago that BirdLife Australia have split the Shrike-tit in their latest list (http://www.birdlife.org.au/conservation/science/taxonomy) and this happened back in August, I have seen no reference to this on Birding-Aus so can I assume that most people do not use that taxonomy – the only reason I noticed is that I . . . → Read More: Shrike-tit split

Birdpedia – Australia – Weekly Digest

The following is a digest of Sightings Reported on Birdpedia for the period Monday, December 9, 2019 to Sunday, December 15, 2019:

Area: SA

Location: Adelaide botanic garden

Little Grassbird (Megalurus gramineus) (1) The little grassbird has been calling from the rushes surrounding one of the storage ponds next to First Creek wetland for a . . . → Read More: Birdpedia – Australia – Weekly Digest

Australian Shelduck.

Hi all there were 2 female Australian Shelducks at Pitt Town Lagoon this morning a fairly rare bird for Sydney. Cheers Michael. Sent from my Samsung GALAXY S5 on the Telstra Mobile network

book wanted

Anyone have a copy of “Peregrines of the World” (Lynx) that you might be ready to let go of ? Judith SEQ 500m

— JudithLA

Fwd: update pallid cuckoos

I would like to suggest what is probably happening. Firstly it would be very strange and hard to imagine how it can ever happen that two juvenile Pallid Cuckoos are being fed by the same individual foster parents. The cuckoo chicks could be siblings (same actual parents – or not) but raised in . . . → Read More: Fwd: update pallid cuckoos