Kangaroos across the road (water utility land).
A destructive introduced pest here, but rabbits (which I do find cute) also there.
Birds, birds, birds: magpies (the Australian male some of which swoop you (language warning) in spring to protect their young...; a typical warning sign), corellas, kookaburras, rainbow lorikeets, rosellas, willy wagtails...
Blue-tongued lizards in the garden.
Neighbours have reported snakes; I'm yet to see one.
"Flying foxes" (fruit bats) of an evening overhead; a large colony in a park in town.
Deer. Introduced.
Koalas once nearby, on the golf course in particular!, but they have been driven away.
All those sound like the creaturess used by the tourist board to show all the diversity of our wildlife.
I walk near a wetland by our place which is very reedy and I'm always on the lookout for snakes, but haven't seen one yet.
All the lovely birds you've listed have been in our garden over the last few days as well as a random pigeon, an awful mynah who seems to be friends with the magpie lark that visits and noisy cockatoos overhead, with their female members in the trees at our place snipping off bits of the manchurian pears and letting them drop everywhere.
Seems like we are being overrun by moose, at least in the outlying areas. There is a mother and her calf on the University of Idaho, just eight miles away in their arboretum. It was not that long ago a young elk walked across our parking lot at the church. Our neighborhood has a resident red fox.
And moose... I know little of them. I imagine they may be dangerous on roads, like kangaroos here, but it must be heartwarming to see a mother and calf!
Kangaroos across the road (water utility land).
A destructive introduced pest here, but rabbits (which I do find cute) also there.
Birds, birds, birds: magpies (the Australian male some of which swoop you (language warning) in spring to protect their young...; a typical warning sign), corellas, kookaburras, rainbow lorikeets, rosellas, willy wagtails...
Blue-tongued lizards in the garden.
Neighbours have reported snakes; I'm yet to see one.
"Flying foxes" (fruit bats) of an evening overhead; a large colony in a park in town.
Deer. Introduced.
Koalas once nearby, on the golf course in particular!, but they have been driven away.
I'm in the hinterland from Byron Bay and see much the same.
When we videolink to our son's family in Japan they often remark about the bird sounds.
We also get King Parrots, especially when the Custard Apple fruits, Wampoo pigeons, pheasant coucals, brush turkeys (which I chase away), plovers, sulphur-crested cockatoos, black cockatoos.
No kangaroos here, but we have echidnas, and also blue-tongues, pink tongues, and water dragons. Carpet pythons visit from time to time, and we see the occasional green tree snake, and yellow-faced whip-snakes (very shy).
We are told deer are around, but I have yet to see one. I have seen a fox.
There are also the dreaded cane toads. We've just started hosting a fridge and freezer for collecting toad toads for an organisation that uses them to trap the tadpoles. I'm not sure if it works, but various people put about 400 in last week.
One thing I miss since moving house is the possums running across the roof. I think they spent the day in trees in our neighbourhood. At night they would leap onto our roof, run down the roof leap into the mulberry tree in our garden and on occasions I would hear them roll around as they hid inside our garage roller door.
I could even forgive them for relieving themselves on stuff in the garage (almost).
Glad to hear that the cane toads are being disposed of humanely.
Southern end of the Rockies at 2,200m/7,200’ elevation and outside of the city where suburbia meets the wild.
We get deer and coyotes sauntering by on regular occasion. I have encountered a bobcat when walking the dog - I’m glad the cat was as not interested in knowing us as us him and it high tailed promptly away to my relief.
Bird-wise many varieties of finches, common sparrow, cardinals, mountain jay and spotted tohee with their distinctive calls.
Had a moose range south from further up north into town even. Said moose was caught and relocated northwards. Said moose has been spotted again locally at the nearby ski resort. Likes New Mexico, I guess.
Black bears about but haven’t seen them with my own eyes- pix in local FB groups tell the tale.
There is a huge variety of birds around here! The normal backyard birds are enjoying bug buffets at my home, especially ibises, grackles and LBJs. The pileated woodpecker has been on my big old oak, along with (mating) squirrels using the oak for a high speed roadway.
My daughter and son-in-law take their daughter out for a walk at least three times every day. CJ loves seeing the birds, including a big owl, several hawks, and roseate spoonbills. She's not as fond of the deer, but seems to not be as afraid of them as she used to be. For a few days, they shared the walkway with walking catfish!
I just love having pink birds here! There are some wild flamingoes at the beaches as well as the spoonbills!
I did hear some sad news today. The two eaglets in the SW FL eagle's nest both died from bird flu.
I have not been up that way for ages (I had relatives in Lismore and biannual trips were made). Sounds delightful.
On cane toads, as Cheery Gardener wrote, seems humane; unlike the video I watched in high school (graphic warning)
of 4WDs purposely, veering, driving over them and making that "pop" sound
I have not been to the Rockies (unless the Albertan mountains are the same chain and are called that, but I am aware of the distance and guess the ecological changes...) So much to see in the US, and your nature is amazing (not at home, but a herd of bison strolling past a tough metal vehicle I was in in Yellowstone December almost 20 years ago was amazing!; and to veer to the opposite end seeing a beaver, yes, do not judge me!, at the base of a waterfall the same day, and then an eagle -- an American eagle! -- was a highlight of my life; but I digress...)
Those roseate spoonbills are gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous.
Very sad about the eaglets. I hope the bird flu can be contained.
I have a copy of Cane Toads - An Unnatural History (1988). I don't think it's the one you saw. It can be found on YouTube.
(I visit Lismore most weeks as a volunteer in the Lismore Business Chaplaincy programme under the NSW Disaster Recovery Chaplaincy Network. Lismore businesses and owners/staff are still suffering from the 2022 floods and requested the DRCN to provide this service.)
About to send you a PM as it may be a bit off topic. But to say thank you for your great work in recovery; I admire people like you immensely (not to embarrass you).
There is a lot of squirrel romance going on in our neighborhood. There is no crow nest building yet. They always come and pull the bark from my palm trees. I have covered my porch light to keep the nesting wren out. The babies are fun, but the mess on the porch is not.
Yesterday I walked along the pathway by the river instead of taking the bus to the local shops and was rewarded by seeing a family of papango*, the small black diving ducks endemic to NZ. They are about half the size of mallards and can divedown a metre and a half when they are only a few days old.
I liked our neighborhood crows. I used to speak to our crows. I would leave them raw peanuts now and again. The crows are attacking our red squirrel family. I do not like the crows anymore. I have stopped speaking to them.
Sorry to read your red squirrels are having such a hard time @Graven Image. I hope they will catch a break soon.
I'm a bit sad this morning as I've noticed wasps building a nest on a dead plant on our patio. I mentioned it to husband hoping he would move the pot to the end of the yard until the wasps were done with it, but no, he has sprayed them in situ and now they are all dead. I am not a fan of spraying things.
In much nicer news I finally hung my bird watering bowl in our lovely crepe myrtle, which means it can be seen from many of the rooms in our house and have filled it with water as well as adding a pile of stones for birds to stand on, I will be watching to see who comes for a drink or a bathe. We will add some padding to the branch to stop the hook digging into it at the weekend.
I've been seeing a lot of wood storks nearby. I frequently see one pair beside a small pond in the median of the interstate. They're just feet away from all the speeding vehicles and don't seem at all bothered!
My back yard has a lot of birds, but my cardinals have not visited me yet. I hear them in the neighborhood, though, so maybe they'll stop here sometime soon. Lots of grackles, LBJs, bluejays, several types of woodpeckers, and a hummingbird once so far. Oh, and regular visits from the Ibis Bug Elimination™ company.
Just watching some buzzards and red kites soaring, not very high up. I guess this is courtship display. And this is in Norfolk where they were unknown 30 years ago. I've no idea where they would nest.
I am attracted to cemeteries (if you all didn't think I was odd already...)
I went to one in a village nearby and was praying Vespers (yes, it gets weirder; there was a reason for this, my Name Saint advises praying near the tombs to overcome a passion -- nothing else is working!) beside many kangaroos, who at one point bounded towards me: maybe to move me along as I was disturbing their peace!
Closer to home and we have ibises (which are colloquially called "bin chickens" as they raid rubbish bins/trash cans) gallore. I find their long bill (nose?) quite threatening...
Youngest Rogueling and went to https://nottinghamshirewildlife.org/nature-reserves/attenborough-nature-reserve to see the starling murmuration over the weekend. There were about thirty people looking over a lake to where the birds were doing their crazy thing. More and more joined every minute and there must have been at least ten thousand by the end - birds that is. They concluded by settling on a field with long grass which turned temporarily black. I do wonder where they all feed.
Heard my first chiff-chaff of the year, seems early. Magnolia is coming out, "blossoms on our magnolia ignite the morning with their murderous five days white", (Lowell).
Since I moved to Spain I have very little vocabulary to describe the bird life in the area apart from pigeons and house sparrows.
We have what I have heard called "monk parakeets" in the Cuban palms - smart raucous little green birds constantly at work doing home improvement/reno/expansion. I call them "squeaker birds" they make a huge racket.
Then there's what I learned here on the Ship what's called a ring necked dove which I call the "poop vogel" because of its copious guano deposits.
Lastly there's what I call "the business bird" who roosts every night in the bougainvillea outside our window. I believe he is the European blackbird, the one with the yellow ringed eye and yellow beak with his "all about the birdy business" attitude.
Every other small drab bird is "not-a-mus". The Dutch call the house sparrow a "mus", so anything that is brown or dull colored and not a mus is a "Not-a-mus".
Cheery husband and I went out on a short drive yesterday and when we returned there were 3 ibis on our front lawn eating grubs/insects. I was surprised because I've never seen them on our lawn before, though I have photos of them in other gardens a couple of streets away.
I have never seen any notice handwritten or otherwise re snakes. I suspect there will be some in the wetland near our place, but I've not seen any. When Cheery son and I take a walk together, we are always chatting and hopefully making enough noise to keep them away.
Every other small drab bird is "not-a-mus". The Dutch call the house sparrow a "mus", so anything that is brown or dull colored and not a mus is a "Not-a-mus".
Every other small drab bird is "not-a-mus". The Dutch call the house sparrow a "mus", so anything that is brown or dull colored and not a mus is a "Not-a-mus".
A sign on @Clarence's University campus. (The Foundation for Australian Literary Studies is based at the Uni. Note the decidedly unliterary possessive apostrophe).
My sister would heartily approve of that sign @Foaming Draught . She has a few dingoes though unfortunately over the last couple of years her older ones are reaching their expiry date.
We had a pheasant coucal wandering around and through the bushes and trees of our garden.
A white headed pigeon likes to sit on the power line to our house.
Yesterday to my astonishment I saw a grey partridge fly up out of a nearby garden - while we have fields just across the road, they are out of sight so we appear pure suburbia. Then, as we got home from a talk yesterday evening, there was much crashing and rustling in our hedge though I wasn't quick enough with the light (needing to turn the entire bike to bring it to bear) - the neighbours were both in the street, apparently it was a badger that had come through their garden first.
This morning many sparrows dustbathing in the garden - it was obviously finally dry enough, and about ten of them were having a really good sesh.
We had a pheasant coucal wandering around and through the bushes and trees of our garden.
A white headed pigeon likes to sit on the power line to our house.
I had to google these. My goodness what pretty birds! I'm a little envious.
All my life in North America my Mom had such a variety of colorful favorites at her feeder, but being here in Iberia, it's rather slim pickings. Dusty olive grey green surroundings, same colored birds.
A little grass appeared through the snow between our house and the river a couple of days ago. Within a few hours it was full of noisy geese fighting over territory. They'll soon be nesting on the bank, so we hope it won't flood. It probably will. The raccoons are coming out, the deer are everywhere, and there will be groundhogs and skunks pretty soon. The ducks are frolicking on the river - it must be purely for pleasure. Why else would they float down the river, spinning around in the current as they go, then fly back up to do it all over again? Being a duck is not a bad life if you can avoid the foxes. The ospreys are back, so there must be fish around here too.
@A Feminine Force Many years ago I was walking on the walls of Obidos when an elderly woman pointed excitedly saying something like "oopoo", so I looked and saw a hoopoe and said "Yes, Hoopoe!" With no language in common we delighted in sharing the ex[erience of that sighting.
Stone Curlews ("Bush thick knee" in Queensland vernacular) are beautiful birds, with a nocturnal cry which sounds like a baby in distress. They're abundant here. But is that a curlew which you hear? 😳
@Stercus Tauri I can see your ducks in my minds eye. I think they use the river as a roller coaster.
It reminded me of when in 2019 we were in France in November and driving along the Loire river whose banks were afire with yellow gingko trees, much like the birch forests back home. The river was swollen with recent rains and there were swans doing the same thing, twirling happily downstream, then flying back upstream and twirling down again.
It was kind of hilarious they looked so dignified and yet silly. We had to pull over and watch for a while.
"Our" butcher bird was singing its beautiful song this morning.
It's frequently around. One morning as we were having breakfast in the garden he hopped onto my foot, and then onto my knee. At another time he flew onto our lunch table and helped himself to the scraps left on my plate.
Unusually, there are no magpies patrolling our garden, but we have had the odd sulphur crested cockatoo, black cockatoo, and small flocks of correllas that did not get scared off by the cyclone.
@A Feminine Force Many years ago I was walking on the walls of Obidos when an elderly woman pointed excitedly saying something like "oopoo", so I looked and saw a hoopoe and said "Yes, Hoopoe!" With no language in common we delighted in sharing the ex[erience of that sighting.
Comments
A destructive introduced pest here, but rabbits (which I do find cute) also there.
Birds, birds, birds: magpies (the Australian male some of which swoop you (language warning) in spring to protect their young...; a typical warning sign), corellas, kookaburras, rainbow lorikeets, rosellas, willy wagtails...
Blue-tongued lizards in the garden.
Neighbours have reported snakes; I'm yet to see one.
"Flying foxes" (fruit bats) of an evening overhead; a large colony in a park in town.
Deer. Introduced.
Koalas once nearby, on the golf course in particular!, but they have been driven away.
I walk near a wetland by our place which is very reedy and I'm always on the lookout for snakes, but haven't seen one yet.
All the lovely birds you've listed have been in our garden over the last few days as well as a random pigeon, an awful mynah who seems to be friends with the magpie lark that visits and noisy cockatoos overhead, with their female members in the trees at our place snipping off bits of the manchurian pears and letting them drop everywhere.
I love the bush capital!!
And, yes, we are known to have cougars too.
And moose... I know little of them. I imagine they may be dangerous on roads, like kangaroos here, but it must be heartwarming to see a mother and calf!
I'm in the hinterland from Byron Bay and see much the same.
When we videolink to our son's family in Japan they often remark about the bird sounds.
We also get King Parrots, especially when the Custard Apple fruits, Wampoo pigeons, pheasant coucals, brush turkeys (which I chase away), plovers, sulphur-crested cockatoos, black cockatoos.
No kangaroos here, but we have echidnas, and also blue-tongues, pink tongues, and water dragons. Carpet pythons visit from time to time, and we see the occasional green tree snake, and yellow-faced whip-snakes (very shy).
We are told deer are around, but I have yet to see one. I have seen a fox.
There are also the dreaded cane toads. We've just started hosting a fridge and freezer for collecting toad toads for an organisation that uses them to trap the tadpoles. I'm not sure if it works, but various people put about 400 in last week.
I could even forgive them for relieving themselves on stuff in the garage (almost).
Glad to hear that the cane toads are being disposed of humanely.
We get deer and coyotes sauntering by on regular occasion. I have encountered a bobcat when walking the dog - I’m glad the cat was as not interested in knowing us as us him and it high tailed promptly away to my relief.
Bird-wise many varieties of finches, common sparrow, cardinals, mountain jay and spotted tohee with their distinctive calls.
Had a moose range south from further up north into town even. Said moose was caught and relocated northwards. Said moose has been spotted again locally at the nearby ski resort. Likes New Mexico, I guess.
Black bears about but haven’t seen them with my own eyes- pix in local FB groups tell the tale.
My daughter and son-in-law take their daughter out for a walk at least three times every day. CJ loves seeing the birds, including a big owl, several hawks, and roseate spoonbills. She's not as fond of the deer, but seems to not be as afraid of them as she used to be. For a few days, they shared the walkway with walking catfish!
I just love having pink birds here! There are some wild flamingoes at the beaches as well as the spoonbills!
I did hear some sad news today. The two eaglets in the SW FL eagle's nest both died from bird flu.
Yes! A delight to see you.
I have not been up that way for ages (I had relatives in Lismore and biannual trips were made). Sounds delightful.
On cane toads, as Cheery Gardener wrote, seems humane; unlike the video I watched in high school (graphic warning)
I have not been to the Rockies (unless the Albertan mountains are the same chain and are called that, but I am aware of the distance and guess the ecological changes...) So much to see in the US, and your nature is amazing (not at home, but a herd of bison strolling past a tough metal vehicle I was in in Yellowstone December almost 20 years ago was amazing!; and to veer to the opposite end seeing a beaver, yes, do not judge me!, at the base of a waterfall the same day, and then an eagle -- an American eagle! -- was a highlight of my life; but I digress...)
Those roseate spoonbills are gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous.
Very sad about the eaglets. I hope the bird flu can be contained.
I have a copy of Cane Toads - An Unnatural History (1988). I don't think it's the one you saw. It can be found on YouTube.
(I visit Lismore most weeks as a volunteer in the Lismore Business Chaplaincy programme under the NSW Disaster Recovery Chaplaincy Network. Lismore businesses and owners/staff are still suffering from the 2022 floods and requested the DRCN to provide this service.)
*otherwise known as blackscaups.
I'm a bit sad this morning as I've noticed wasps building a nest on a dead plant on our patio. I mentioned it to husband hoping he would move the pot to the end of the yard until the wasps were done with it, but no, he has sprayed them in situ and now they are all dead. I am not a fan of spraying things.
In much nicer news I finally hung my bird watering bowl in our lovely crepe myrtle, which means it can be seen from many of the rooms in our house and have filled it with water as well as adding a pile of stones for birds to stand on, I will be watching to see who comes for a drink or a bathe. We will add some padding to the branch to stop the hook digging into it at the weekend.
My back yard has a lot of birds, but my cardinals have not visited me yet. I hear them in the neighborhood, though, so maybe they'll stop here sometime soon. Lots of grackles, LBJs, bluejays, several types of woodpeckers, and a hummingbird once so far. Oh, and regular visits from the Ibis Bug Elimination™ company.
I went to one in a village nearby and was praying Vespers (yes, it gets weirder; there was a reason for this, my Name Saint advises praying near the tombs to overcome a passion -- nothing else is working!) beside many kangaroos, who at one point bounded towards me: maybe to move me along as I was disturbing their peace!
Closer to home and we have ibises (which are colloquially called "bin chickens" as they raid rubbish bins/trash cans) gallore. I find their long bill (nose?) quite threatening...
Oh! How wonderful.
Yes: ours can be rather screechy at times, but some have some nice songs.
Some hand-written.
Beautiful birds, though. Have you seen them in the wild? Another thing on the list for when you come up 😊
Any drop in the number of trespassers after you put that up?
We have what I have heard called "monk parakeets" in the Cuban palms - smart raucous little green birds constantly at work doing home improvement/reno/expansion. I call them "squeaker birds" they make a huge racket.
Then there's what I learned here on the Ship what's called a ring necked dove which I call the "poop vogel" because of its copious guano deposits.
Lastly there's what I call "the business bird" who roosts every night in the bougainvillea outside our window. I believe he is the European blackbird, the one with the yellow ringed eye and yellow beak with his "all about the birdy business" attitude.
Every other small drab bird is "not-a-mus". The Dutch call the house sparrow a "mus", so anything that is brown or dull colored and not a mus is a "Not-a-mus".
AFF
Ha ha.
A Ukrainian friend finds it baffling (and concerning...) how often there are signs, formal and informal, on snakes around here.
I have never seen any notice handwritten or otherwise re snakes. I suspect there will be some in the wetland near our place, but I've not seen any. When Cheery son and I take a walk together, we are always chatting and hopefully making enough noise to keep them away.
We have a guide to those in Australia 😉
I spat my coffee all over the screen. Next time a little warning maybe? 😂
AFF
A white headed pigeon likes to sit on the power line to our house.
This morning many sparrows dustbathing in the garden - it was obviously finally dry enough, and about ten of them were having a really good sesh.
I had to google these. My goodness what pretty birds! I'm a little envious.
All my life in North America my Mom had such a variety of colorful favorites at her feeder, but being here in Iberia, it's rather slim pickings. Dusty olive grey green surroundings, same colored birds.
Hoping to catch a glimpse of a hoopoe someday.
AFF
It reminded me of when in 2019 we were in France in November and driving along the Loire river whose banks were afire with yellow gingko trees, much like the birch forests back home. The river was swollen with recent rains and there were swans doing the same thing, twirling happily downstream, then flying back upstream and twirling down again.
It was kind of hilarious they looked so dignified and yet silly. We had to pull over and watch for a while.
AFF
It's frequently around. One morning as we were having breakfast in the garden he hopped onto my foot, and then onto my knee. At another time he flew onto our lunch table and helped himself to the scraps left on my plate.
Unusually, there are no magpies patrolling our garden, but we have had the odd sulphur crested cockatoo, black cockatoo, and small flocks of correllas that did not get scared off by the cyclone.
Lucky you! I live in hope. 🙏🤞
AFF