Fellow travelers

Carol Mason in New South Wales is a new virtual friend, introduced by a friend in Western Australia. We are both entranced by the creatures who share our world. Some of you will remember seeing galahs in a couple posts on this blog, while Robin and I were traveling in Australia. Carol has them all around her. Here are her photos and her words.

I have a deep interest in preserving our wildlife in Australia, from necessity, with many things happening. These galahs flew into our yard, with a flock, and began preening one another. So lovely to see them wild and free.

They regularly swoop into the yard and perch and delight me in their antics and their capacity to come and go as they please. Something which I hope we all encourage …. the rights of our fellow travellers to do so.

“Silly galah” is an Australian slang expression, used for someone who’s foolish. Galah behavior can seem quirky and funny, as you watch them in large flocks or paired up and perched on a wire. They are very social birds. Galahs are ubiquitous. Not everyone appreciates them, just as pigeons in urban Canada are not universally admired. The Australian Galah Web site has photos and all kinds of resources on these members of the cockatoo family.

Winged neighbours

Before we came to Australia, Robin warned me about the “Australian wave”. It’s meant to shoo away flies, the pesky little beasts that are one of the reasons the country has so many birds.

I’m happy to report not having been plagued by the flying nuisances that have an unerring knack for landing in ears, eyes, and noses. I’m also happy to report that Robin was right about the birds. They are plentiful and colourful.

Here are a few of my favourites.

Kookaburra

Kookaburra in Perth's Kings Park

Robin grew up with the laughter of the kookaburra. I’d never heard nor seen one before coming to Australia. Still, the first time I heard the staccato buildup and then the long laugh, I knew instantly what I was hearing, even though there was not a kookaburra in sight.

I haven’t seen many examples of this member of the kingfisher family, but they are integral to the Australian landscape. The few I’ve seen have been one of the highlights of this journey. Here’s a You Tube video where you can hear them: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0ZbykXlg6Q&feature=related

Magpies

Australians get misty eyed when they’re in a foreign land and think of magpies. North Americans might find that surprising. Ours are slim-bodied, black-and-white ground hoppers who fly from one food source to the next. They are cheeky birds with tails as long as their bodies. Their song sounds like a slightly musical crow.

Australian magpies fit the same description in many ways, but their songs are more varied and complex. My favourite is a melodic warble that moves up and down the scale like a musical waterfall. There are a lot of recordings on You Tube. I think this one on the “Common Birds of the Australian National Botanic Garden” site captures the sound well.

Magpie visiting us in Port Elliot

Magpies wake us in Australia. Robin’s cousin Judy and her husband Art say the maggies sing on full-moon nights. We’ll miss their song when we’re back in Canada.

Crested pigeons

When I was young, we drove adults wild by singing: “Three wood pigeons sitting on a fence. Look, one flew away. Two wood pigeons. Look, one flew away. One wood pigeon. Look, one flew back. Two…”

Crested pigeons in a tug of war over some tasty morsel in the Adelaide Botanic Garden

Of course, there were more lines than that, all of them repetitive. We’d sing it endlessly, ignoring pleas to stop or at least sing something else.

Wood pigeons are British and extend into parts of Asia. Here the common pigeon is the feisty crested pigeon. They still remind me of the old song, singing a cheeky Australian version.  Some consider their call repetitive and boring. Others love it. It’s part of the dawn chorus, a distinctive whoop and a familiar (to North Americans) coo.

Crow song

Crows here sing a different melody. To me, they sound like Siamese cats in heat. It’s a lighter, quieter tone than our raucous North American birds, but the sound is about as pleasing.

Crow in Kings Park, Perth

Lorikeets

Rainbow lorikeet in a bottle brush tree

Before we came to Australia, Robin told me to expect a lot of flies and other small, annoying creatures. That’s why there are so many colourful birds, he said, because they have so much to eat.

I’m happy to report that city dwellers are not unduly plagued by flying beasties, but they are surrounded by flashes of brilliant colour, thanks to the ubiquitous lorikeets. Flowering gums, bottle brush trees, and other flowering plants attract these members of the parrot family. The two I’ve photographed are the rainbow and musk lorikeets.

Musk lorikeet feeding on flowers in a gum tree

I’ve never liked the idea of birds being confined to cages. These bright birds have successfully adapted to the urban landscape. I hope never to see another of them trapped in a small, wired home.

Galahs

I’ve finally some of the antics behind the expression, “silly galah”. I was walking Charles, the toy poodle we are looking after, and didn’t have my camera, but when I heard screeching and looked up, three galahs were clinging to the overhead wires.

One of them suddenly flopped over and hung upside down, swinging back and forth before it righted itself. A second lifted its claws to scratch and tumbled off the wire. While all this was going on, the third, whose perch was destabilized by his unsteady neighbours, bobbed calmly back and forth as the wire swung.

Smart and saucy, the galah has earned its reputation through some of its aerial antics

Galahs are often considered nuisances. They travel in large flocks and have good appetites, which can be at odds with farmers and gardeners since they feed on seeds of grasses and cultivated crops. Since I’m neither farming nor gardening, I just enjoy watching these sociable birds.

Redbrow firetail finches near Mylor in the Adelaide Hills

Redbrow firetail finch

Our first and only view of this little finch was in the Adelaide Hills, where we’d driven for lunch with Robin’s cousin. We were sitting on the terrace, surrounded by lush greenery. Before long, the finches were ignoring us, and we got a good look at the bright red stripes on their brows and the splash of red on their tails.

Coastal birds

We’ve seen dozens of other breeds of birds, all of them common to coastal Australia. For me they were all new. I’d only seen photographs of them and was thrilled to watch them in their natural habitats. I can’t include them all, but here are a few who’ve graced my days in this warm land.

Pelican at Cleland Wildlife Park

Nankeen kestrel seen on our walk with friends in Marino, on the south side of Adelaide

Touring around Melbourne

December 30, 2008

I saw my first roos today, three of them. Only problem was the first two kangaroos were road kill. The third, well, I saw only a piece of him or her, lying in chunks on my plate, covered with plum sauce.

Robin talking with the Watsons in Warrandyte, a Melbourne suburb

We were in the dining room of Fergusson’s winery, one of the many small wineries scattered around the Yarra Valley. Our hosts, Charles and Judith Watson, were introducing us to more of the outer suburbs and the country towns and valleys that lie to the northeast of Melbourne. When we stopped at the winery for lunch, Charles encouraged me to try the kangaroo fillet.

I hadn’t been able to taste anything since a bronchial infection invaded in mid-December and was reluctant to waste a taste exploration. So first I sampled the soda bread waiting for us on the table the Watsons had reserved. Since I could actually taste it, I opted for the culinary experience of native meat.

The flavour of the kangaroo was surprisingly subtle, the meat completely devoid of fat. The Fergusson’s chef had roasted the lean fillet gently, leaving it slightly pink. The meal was accompanied by rich potato gratin and a salad of baby spinach, pecans, and roast pumpkin.

So I’m sold on ‘roo as an option for the rare red meat we eat. Since kangaroos are native and don’t fart methane, they’re a more environmentally sound choice anyway.

As to the salad, I can’t recall ever seeing pumpkin on a North American salad menu. What we call “squash”, Australians call “pumpkin”. No matter the variety of squash (and there are fewer than in Canada), it is all “pumpkin”. Here in Oz it is used more extensively than in North America. Pumpkin shows up in soup, salad, and casseroles, as side dishes and main courses. It’s all delicious for those of us who love the sweet flesh of this long-lasting vegetable.

Cockatoo outside Warrandyte antique store

The day with the Watsons was my first chance to see cockatoos in the wild. They were in Warrandyte, a suburb on the north side of Melbourne. The birds were drawn to the seeds provided by the owners of an antique store with attached restaurant.

Sharing the seeds that dropped from the feeders was a galah. I’m enchanted with the pink-chested, grey-backed birds, but the truth is they’re about as useful as starlings. Calling someone a “silly galah” is common slang and definitely not a compliment.

Galah feeding near the cockatoo

But I’m getting ahead of myself because on the 27th Darren and Nat drove us out into the countryside northwest of Melbourne to visit Daylesford. It’s another of the lively small communities “the kids” (Robin’s children and their partners) think might be the kind of place we’d enjoy calling home.

This being school holidays, Daylesford was packed with visitors, many of them families. Set in spa country and home to a growing gay community, the town is a hilly, tree-lined charmer. It’s about an hour and a half out of Melbourne, but it is definitely a good candidate for a livable, small town.

Cathryn and Robin with Richard and Marie Clivaz at Domaine Chandon winery

On the 29th Richard and Marie Clivaz took us on a drive through countryside that reminded us of the Okanagan. That’s not homesickness talking here. You can see by the view from the Yarra Valley division of the French winery, Domaine Chandon, that the region has many vistas that resemble our British Columbian wine valley. The flora are different, but the views are similar.

Although this was not our first foray into the Yarra Valley, we saw many parts of it for the first time and other parts from different directions. Yarra Glen was one of those. Approaching from a new direction made the town more interesting. We saw enough of the surrounding neighbourhoods to see it as a town with possibilities large enough and far enough from Melbourne (so not just a bedroom community) to be a place where we could get involved with the community. One more option to consider.