Southern Boobook

SOUTHERN BOOBOOK  Ninox novaeseelandiae

The other morning I was working in the garden. All morning I could hear a pair of wattlebirds in the maple trees in the driveway.

They were complaining about someone or something. There had been a snake around recently and I thought that perhaps they had found it.



I had a close look and found this poor owl, trying to sleep in the topmost branches of the trees. It did seem quite unconcerned by the attention of the wattlebirds, eyes tightly shut, then a quick look around, the head tucked back in and off to sleep.



When I went through my pictures of owls, I found the images taken of another tree, a year ago, almost to the day.

Same bird? This one looks quite plump. Last years a a little more slender.

I wonder if it is the same bird?

 

Buff-rumped Thornbill

BUFF-RUMPED THORNBILL

I visited a new area last week, the Green's Pinch Reserve, just to the north of Kilmore.

This is an area of pasture and wooded clumps in behind the houses behind Branigan Drive. At the end of this road is track leading into the Green's Pinch Reserve. It is a reserve, known only to the people living in the area and contains gullies and hills which give sweeping 360 degree views of the Kilmore area.

Plenty of kangaroos and some birdlife to be seen.

On an early morning visit last week, these thornbills were feeding and playing amongst the low undergrowth. They were quite unafraid and it was easy to get in close for a good look

There are numbers of thornbills around Kilmore, these are the Buff-rumped Thornbills. Little puffballs with yellow chests, bellies and rumps. They have plain brown upper bodies and  the freckled faces of many of the other thornbills.

On this day there was a group of fifteen to twenty birds feeding amongst the small wattle trees and on the ground amongst grassy patches.