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Bird Bites
Australia
เข้าร่วมเมื่อ 22 ส.ค. 2021
Bird Bites is a channel all about the wonderful world of birds. Subscribe and check back regularly for more videos on all things birds!
Grey fantail
I love it when hyperactive birds sit still! It doesn't happen very often with Grey fantails, but this one was having a nice rest at Cooby Dam near Toowoomba, about a month ago.
This is the alisteri sub-species. There's six sub-species of Grey fantails, with the alisteri sub-species extending from southern Queensland down to Victoria. The southern most alisteri members do migrate north and west in winter, but I suspect the ones on the Darling Downs don't.
This is the alisteri sub-species. There's six sub-species of Grey fantails, with the alisteri sub-species extending from southern Queensland down to Victoria. The southern most alisteri members do migrate north and west in winter, but I suspect the ones on the Darling Downs don't.
มุมมอง: 52
วีดีโอ
Stress regrowth on gum tree
มุมมอง 379 ชั่วโมงที่ผ่านมา
This eucalypt is showing interesting regrowth in my paddock. I believe this is a stress response after a hard time. I wasn't really checking it back in the drought but I presume it had a hard time then, and since the last few years have been wet it's now rebounding. I've noticed two large trees die on our property in that time, and I'm glad this one hasn't gone the same way. If you've ever obse...
Great egret hunting
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Here's a Great egret hunting in a dam in SE Queensland. The long neck has two purposes. It allows the bird to keep some distance away from the prey and not scare it away. And it also allows energy to be stored when the neck is in its recoiled position and then rapidly expelled to make a quick strike at the prey
Galahs preening
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Here's some nice footage of two galahs allopreening. The male is on the left and the female is on the right. This is a great activity which helps keep the skin and feathers in tip top condition and also reinforces social bonds. I filmed this back when it was warm LOL!
Microbat relocation
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It's definitely a day for cold animals! I just pulled down our shed door and this little microbat fell out in a state of torpor. I happily relocated him somewhere safer
Hibernating cane toads
มุมมอง 72วันที่ผ่านมา
I just found two hibernating cane toads in a branch I was cutting up ~ I didn't know they did this
Channel 7 Toowoomba News - Regent honeyeaters
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Here's the Channel 7 news story on the Regent honeyeaters.
The importance of the Swift parrot and Regent honeyeater visiting Toowoomba
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I did this video to explain the importance of the Swift parrot and Regent honeyeater visiting Toowoomba at the moment - feel free to share this with anyone who you think needs to understand it
Regent honeyeater Friday 28/6/2024
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A little more footage of our favourite visitor
Birds at water trough 25/6/2024
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Just by chance I've noticed that a group of Honeyeaters have taken to bathing in one of our horse troughs between 10am and noon pretty much every day. So I set my camera and caught some of the action - it's mainly Yellow-faced honeyeaters and White-naped honeyeaters, but there were a few surprise visitors as well. The first 1:45 is the highlights and then there's about 5 minutes of unedited foo...
Regent honeyeater - more footage
มุมมอง 122หลายเดือนก่อน
Here's some better footage of one of the Regent honeyeaters at Highfields Falls
Regent honeyeater
มุมมอง 85หลายเดือนก่อน
Well in my local area (Toowoomba - Darling Downs) we're hitting a purple patch for rare birds. There are three Regent honeyeaters here now and they are even rarer than Swift parrots. There's only about 300 Regent honeyeaters left. They used to be all over SE Australia - and in the 19th century were one of the most common honeyeaters in Australia. They are now restricted to the western slopes of...
Bird painting exhibition in Crows Nest
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This great bird painting exhibition is on at the Nest Cafe in Crows Nest right now - until August 10th. There's some really good art work here.
Eastern Barn owl gastric pellets
มุมมอง 41หลายเดือนก่อน
I was doing bird surveys on private property in the Lockyer Valley this morning and the land holder showed me this site. He had seen an Eastern Barn Owl here many times before, and it had left plenty of gastric pellets
Ch 7 news article on Swift Parrots visiting Toowoomba
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Ch 7 news article on Swift Parrots visiting Toowoomba
Indigenous mural - Grand Central Shopping Centre, Toowoomba
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Indigenous mural - Grand Central Shopping Centre, Toowoomba
Legless lizard relocation (not a snake!)
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Legless lizard relocation (not a snake!)
Double-eyed fig parrot, at Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary
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Double-eyed fig parrot, at Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary
Friendly Red-tailed black cockatoo, at the Wildlife Habitat, Port Douglas
มุมมอง 55หลายเดือนก่อน
Friendly Red-tailed black cockatoo, at the Wildlife Habitat, Port Douglas
Would be good to get some bird song instead of the jolly ditty
Yes I thought that myself and stopped putting music on my clips a year or two ago
What do you think would be the cause of this?
I've been told it's a stress response after having a few rough years in the drought
Parrots are made of love ...and screams.
I thought that was Kano rat from mortal kombat
Nice work Batman
Thanks!
such a gorgeous bird!!!
Poor thing. Makes you want to take him home and give him a good life without struggling and fear of being killed in any instant.
Whats wrong with its eye. He kind of looks like a rat terminator with it like that.
I think he lost it in a fight :-(
Wow! Beautiful! Thank you for posting.
No worries
Brilliant video. Your take on humans depending upon the rest of our ecosphere is 100% correct. Sadly, those people making those particular comments are online trolls. You can't educate them.
Thanks. Yes it's a hard question on how to reach people like that. Common sense certainly doesn't. I think they find it too confrontational and that they have too much to lose
@@birdbites I see a lot of uncaring selfish people in society now. Around 18 months ago, I was heading off to work. Spotted a stunned Rainbow Lorikeet on my lane. Slowed, pulled to the side, put emergencies on and got out of the car. I see One of these idiots in their big Yankee style utes speeding along, oblivious, flag it to slow down, nah. Just ignored me and kept going. I am 100% certain that they saw the lori on the road. He thankfully narrowly missed it. The driver behind him slowed and stopped. I was able to get out onto the road and pick the Rainbow Lorikeet up and get it into my car. I drove down to the next street and turned into it and parked in a driveway. The suddenly stunned Lori came to and was trying to get out of my car, so I opened the passenger and door and et voila! It flew off at speed LOL. I tell this story because near 100% of drivers wouldn't have stopped and if I hadn't stopped, it'd certainly been killed. Needlessly. You just can't argue with stupid and the majority of the human species is now stupid imho.
Great to see it on the news, worried about non birders rocking up and stressing the hell out of these birds. 2 were there on 30/6 and only 1 last Sunday 6/7.
Yes that's always a concern. Given that these birds are so high up they should be right. But it's always something to be aware of
@@birdbites there are a lot of idiots out there sadly.
I have just bought a copy of this book, however upon learning that it is a condensed version of the Australian Bird Guide, the colouring of the distribution maps for each species is not clearly explained in the beginning of the book - it is the case that pages with subspecies that vary in appearance are colour-coded, and that's clear enough. Is the meaning of the light and dark green shading on the distribution map ever explained in the Australian Bird Guide?
Hi there, yes it is explained in the ABG. The darker shaded areas is where a bird is commonly found, the lighter shaded areas are for where it may be found, but isn't common. And agree, that should have been explained in the compact edition.
Sounds like a Yellow Oriole to me. Cheers
Thanks Jason - I'm not familiar with them, but will look and listen out for them next time I'm up there
Are the birds still in Toowoomba? I was thinking about coming sometime this week, or should I leave earlier?
Still there, but with the wet weather and the fact it's getting later in the season I don't know how long they'll stay
@@birdbites Thanks mate! Will head up there soon! Are there any other hotspots up there that I could visit in a day where I could get some other rarer species, or just some that we don't get on the Sunshine Coast?
7 swift parrots see by myself last Sunday 6/7. Confirmed by 2 other birders at the time, although eBird is basically saying I'm lying. They were at Picnic point, at the bottom of Tobruk drive. They are difficult to spot when high in the Eucalypts. They don't tend to chatter like lories do when feeding. Regent Honeyeater at Highfield falls - 2 spotted on 30/6, but only a singular bird on 6/7. Easier to spot than the Swift parrots, although they are high up in the trees too. I'm so happy that I got to see both species.
@@WildCaught73 Devon park boundary road for ground cuckoo shrikes, red backed kingfisher (lifer for me) and white winged fairywrens (haven't spotted any adult males in full plumage on either visit on 30/6 and 6/7). Spotted a pair of Nankeen Kestrels. Spotted Red backed Kingfisher. Thought I'd spotted the ground cuckoo shrikes, but sadly, they are normal black faced species. Did spot several Golden headed Cisticolas on 30/6 visit, but not 6/7 visit. Arthur shooter memorial park had quite a fair few scaley breasted lorikeets that weren't too afraid of humans (got a few nice shots of a pair). I didn't follow the river down as I didn't have time. Cory st park has lots of red rumped parrots feeding on the grasses amongst Galahs. There's lot of dogs in this park, so kind of hard to get close to them as dogs spook them a fair bit. There was also a whistling kite there trying to pick them off on 30/6 (I didn't go back on 6/7). bird hyphen spot dot com has a good page on these 3 locations. replace hyphen with an actual hyphen (google won't let me post URLs, deletes posts). Google "birding around oakey boundary rd" and it's like the 3rd link. There is a powerful owl male that roosts at highfield falls near the track, just past the turn off for the waterfalls, but please be careful. Large numbers have been congregating to spot/photography him and he wasn't there on 6/7. Some are reporting that he has a nesting female near his regular roost and that there's a high risk of abandonment of the nest, so probably best to leave them alone imho. Highfield falls - other than the regent honeyeater, I spotted male & female king parrots, a pair of pale headed rosellas, female regent bowerbird, rainbow bee eaters, several eastern yellow robins and a pair of little lorikeets (lifer for me) on 30/6. Spotted a male mistletoe bird on 6/7 visit. Usual culprits (noisy miners, magpies, torresian crows) easily spotted of course. I didn't extensively explore this location as I'm not in the best fitness shape and carrying around a R3 and 500f4 prime (mark 1, so even heavier) is rather tiring). ymmv. There are several nesting rainbow lorikeets at picnic point (tobruk drive), more scaley breasted lorikeets too, laughing kookaburras etc. Definitely well worth visiting. For Brisbane metro, archerfield wetlands, sandy camp wetlands, oxley creek common are all well worthwhile visiting. scarlet honeyeaters (both male & female) have been feeding up on Tooheys ridge at Tooheys forest (take the Cheval st location and park there and follow the climb up the ridge - it's only ~300m). Halfway up there's a fork, take the left fork and finish going up - you'll end up at a T intersection on Tooheys ridge. There are flowering Black boys ~100m on either side of this T intersection. Best to get up around 10am. I found that the birds have been reliably visiting around 10.30am and come and go in waves through to around 1.30pm. Also visiting are yellow faced honeyeaters. Lots of striated pardalotes too, but they are usually high up in the tree. Noisy friarbirds also feed on the black boy flowers, and you can get some great shots at eye level, but you do need a long focal length (I shoot at 700mm on my full frame R3 and they are still tiny). A R7 with a Sigma 150-600 and 1.4x TC will get some great shots. I've seen the scarlets at 4 locations over the past month: tooheys forest oxley creek common hardings paddock sgt dan stiller park hardings paddock out west, ~15 min drive south of Yamanto is well worth a visit too. There is several Rose robins out there, although being lucky enough to come across them is a challenge (6 visits in the past 6 weeks, only spotted once). Look for them in the bush tucker track. I hope this helps!
@@davepastern I went out there and saw five swift parrots and a regent honeyeater. I'm also so glad!!!
Are the parrots still there? I am thinking about going sometime this week but don't want to miss them.
They were there a few days ago, don't know about right now. Sorry for the late info
Wonderful video
Thanks
Definitely an olive backed sunbird nest! I used to get them nest under my veranda in Townsville North QLD. Cheers
Thanks Jason
Fantastic work you’re doing here, getting the message out there on the problems we have.
Thanks for that
Looks like a juvenile bird, as it hasn't completed the moult and developed its red brow stripes. Maybe pesticide poisoning from feeding on contaminated seeding grasses along road verges. Cheers
Good pick up Jason
Бедненькая! Как мне её жалко! Она и бежать то не может, задыхается. Глазик воспалён, сильная инфекция.
Cool
Get reeaal . . . get reeaal . . . get reeaal . . . get reeaal . . .
I hope they do one on the Regent Honeyeater now too. What a week for Toowoomba!
Quite possible
Wow, fascinating. I'm always amazed by the diversity of creatures there are!
Yeah he was pretty interesting- and slippery
Oh, interesting! Beautiful bird!
Thanks for the video!
Wonderful video and bird ❤
They are lovely - they seem very calm
Armes Ratti!
My son went for these yestrday with his friends from UQ. Sad to know they'll be potentially extinct soon 😢
Hope they got to see them. They were still there today
@@birdbites They did see them
@@richardgreenwood7918 Terrific :-)
Fantastic to see the video Scot!! And yes very sad, we just can't help ourselves can we.
Just can't believe it's so obvious but they still allow the logging
its eye got bitten off in a fight likely
Yes, seems likely
I like magpies
Wonderful to see them, and so terribly sad they're about to disappear forever.
I rushed up from the Gold Coast to see them - a special experience but so desperately sad that it may be my last before they go extinct.
Poor animals, all species are amazing and God's creations. Factory-Farms are the worst tho
Болеет малышка, жаль... Это все-же братья наши меньшие, хотим мы этого или не хотим...😢
Ваши наверное да
😮
My problem is memory so I just use Google to identify. I would hope if I got it wrong a viewer would correct it. Good video
He looks so peaceful there. Great shot and interesting info. I was aware that they are not owls and have read that they are related to the nightjar family. Thanks for the education.
You're welcome
Great video, thank you 🦘🐨
Had one land on my head while I was asleep in bed. Flew in through the open window and immediately woke me up. It was 2am. After spending the next few hours together I managed to drape a soft cotton cloth over its whole body. We both remained calm as I approached the open window and unveiled it. There was quite a pause before it took off with powerful force, into the darkness. Incredible!
Wow - what an amazing experience, thanks for sharing :-) I've just uploaded a video of one sleeping right now too
@@birdbites yeah they now have my attention. When I was younger it was my father who pointed them out to me. They were living in a tree not far from his house in the Atherton Tablelands N Qld. It was morning light and I pretended to see them but they blended in beautifully. A family of around five of them from what I recall. When I realised what I was looking at it was incredibly intriguing. Now a fan for life. Where can I find what you have uploaded?
@@deeonugarapulcountryyugger6629 there's a few here www.youtube.com/@birdbites/search?query=tawny the most recent one is this th-cam.com/video/DWqRY3u1yLE/w-d-xo.html where I talk about Tawny frogmouths a bit and show one sleeping
@@birdbites thank you. I'll be sure to check them out. I just subscribed to your channel so shall enjoy navigating my way around.
Wow, that's a really cool creature. You're so lucky for finding it.
Thanks - I've seen a few others around here as well, so I guess I'm lucky to have them in the area
"I love you!” "Go away."
LOL that's about it!
What a wonderful, special little guy!! They're so rare (and cute!). Most people don't even know they exist and assume they're snakes (and kill them).
Yes I've heard they do get killed for snakes. I was a bit cautious when I first picked him up, but I was pretty sure he was a lizard - they have different shaped heads. That's what I was going on anyway until I saw the legs
Yep, that's it. The lack of a defined neck, and the shape of the head kind of gives it away. Good on you for saving the little one.
thats not the real one ?
Correct, it is a cast
in Portarlinton at an outdoor cafe, this large bird jumped onto the table in front of me and squarked at me. I’d only arrived and had nothing to offer. I think it was a currawong. I read they can be aggressive at picnics.
Thanks for that! That would have been a surprise - I've never heard of them being super aggressive though - but that one certainly made its intentions clear :-)
@@birdbites I remember the thud noise as it plopped in front of me. I suspect it was a regular customer at that cafe.
Thanks for this. It's a shame the universe and all living things have to "adapt" to dysfunctional, chaotic human living. We should be working around all that is. I feel very sad when I see wasted, crushed, wildlife on the side of the road run over by speeding drivers. The poor creatures don't stand a chance.
Why should humans not be allowed to take up their space like any other animals.
@@bojohannesen4352 you have misinterpreted what I have said. I didn't say humans don't deserve the space they have, we take that "space " for granted. The wild world only uses what it needs, it doesn't grasp for more or is motivated by greed.
@@bojohannesen4352 you have misinterpreted what I said. Humans do take up their space on this earth, but take more than is needed, grasping and motivated by greed. The wild world only takes what it needs and no more. We don't live in harmony with what has been here on this earth for a long time, and are set on destroying what gives us life.
The anchor will be next .
FYI ..............The Federal Health Department is seeking staff views on what the new name for its Sirius building in Woden should be. It seems the Federal Government wants it changed because the First Fleet’s arrival, which marked the beginning of European settlement in Australia, is now regarded by many as the commencement of European invasion. HMS Sirius was the flagship and was actually named after the star in the Orion constellation. Some campaigning public servants have objected to the building they work in being in any way associated with colonisation. It’s becoming more important to some than their actual work in contributing to good health policy.
Thanks for that - I can understand why some people find it offensive, but if you change too much stuff you essentially end up re-writing history, I'm generally more in favour of seeing plaques and interpretive things added than changing things altogether. But I think there are some cases where there should be exceptions to that - ie I do think renaming Major Mitchell Cockatoos was a good idea, after what he did
Fascinating.