Hi there,
I wonder if anyone can shed light on what I observed the other day.
I have been visiting a Satin Bowerbird’s bower in the Otways of southern Victoria for some years now. I was there in August, and the scene was as normal. A well maintained avenue, plenty of blue items, mostly of the man made plastic type, and Bowerbird activity around, “green” birds flying to and fro, and a male bird never far away.
I visited again last month, and was surprised to see nothing there. The site was empty. There was no evidence of any avenue whatsoever. All decorations removed, except for one shabby bit of blue tape half buried. The only evidence that anything had been there before was a layer of small bits of broken sticks/twigs on the ground, all very short.
Would a rival male so completely remove all evidence to this extent ??
Cheers,
Simon Starr,
Victoria.
===============================
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message: unsubscribe (in the body of the message, with no Subject line) to: birding-aus-request@vicnet.net.au
http://birding-aus.org ===============================
Hi Simon,
I’ve had Satin Bowerbirds maintaining bowers in my yard for the last 10 years or so.
The current male seems set on the current location but early on there was a bit shuffling going on. A bird would appear to be settled on a site and then, just as you describe, everything would disappear. A quick search of the yard would find he’d shifted to another location.
The birds have used 4 locations in the yard, (two were practise bowers built by immature birds), but there were two locations the dominant male preferred and alternated between on what seemed like a seasonal basis. I got the feeling that the bird changed due to changing vegetation cover (deciduous plants) on a seasonal basis, although I can’t verify that.
The site alternation was relatively predictable, but it hasn’t happened for a few years now.
I’d suggest looking around the general area to see what you can dig up, or alternatively, if you have a bit of time, sit at the location you’ve mentioned, and it’s likely you’ll hear activity at the new site (if it exists) to lead you to it.
Kind Regards,
Allan Richardson Morisset NSW
===============================
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message: unsubscribe (in the body of the message, with no Subject line)
http://birding-aus.org ===============================