Pied Currawong – Birds as Poetry —— Just because I WANDER

Thought I’d continue with the “Showman’ style theme.

We had taken a walk to the far west of the You Yangs Park to where the fenceline runs parallel to Hovell’s Creek. The creek is on private property so the best we are able to do is peek over toward the creek. The Rainbow Bee-eaters come down each year to nest in the creek banks, and hunt out over the You Yangs side of the fence, so it’s possible on the right day to get good views and photos of them in action. Such, however was not to be on our day.

Isn’t marketing wonderful! Hovell’s Creek is one of the few places named for the second half of the Hume and Hovell exploration team that first travelled down this way.
Hume gets all the good named spots and also all the good Marketing Opportunities.
Hume Highway, Hume City Council, Hume Building Society, Hume Bank, and so it goes.
Marketing is such that Hovell City Council just doesn’t have that right appeal, nor would you want to leave you money with Hovell Bank, or build your house along the Hovell Highway.
Isn’t Marketing Wonderful!

How about a product we know well. Glad-Wrap. Imagine if it had been called Sad-Wrap. Not much future there I’d guess.

We did hear a few Bee-eater calls from the creek line, but no real glimpses.

However further along the track we did hear, and see Pied Currawongs.
A family group of about a dozen or so birds were working over the grasses catching flying insects (Ants?)

They worked from several trees about 50-60m apart and simply flew from one branch over the open to another branch. Picking off an insect along the way.
I’ve seen Wagtails, and Flycatchers, and Jacky Winters work this way, but not such big birds. Hard to imagine they had the twisting and turning skills, but they certainly showed a range of aeronautical abilities and held us spell-bound for about 15 minutes.
A pity the light was running against us, but it was still great to be able to get a range of wing and body details.