Sunday Snapshot

Winter morning, by the lake.

Hamilton, New Zealand

Pukeko

Road Trip to the Wild West (Part 2)

In the first post (see here), I talked about a trip to see a lighthouse on a cloudy summer day.

Later I met these guys, holding a meeting:

And this bunch:

These two had other fish to fry:

What I am interested in with birds, just as I am with spiders or monkeys, is what they do and why they do it.

~ David Attenborough

Birds of a Feather

An assemblage of swans, gulls, etc:

Tagged swan, Melbourne

Red-billed Gull (Larus novaehollandiae)

Hope is the thing with feathers 

That perches in the soul, 

And sings the tune without the words, 

And never stops at all

~ Emily Dickinson

Black Shag (Phalacrocorax carbo)

Shag + Gulls

Swans + Gull, Lake Rotorua

Peacock, Tuscan vineyard

Southern Black-backed Gulls (Larus dominicanus)

I know why the caged bird sings, ah me,
   When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore,--
When he beats his bars and he would be free;
It is not a carol of joy or glee,
   But a prayer that he sends from his heart’s deep core,
But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings--
I know why the caged bird sings!

~ Paul Laurence Dunbar

For Thematic Photographic # 307

Blurred vision

Thematic Photographic 253:

I am always trying to take photos of birds.
They are never very successful because I don't have the right lens - but I keep trying. 

Carmi's theme this week allows me to post some blurry birds. 

These are seagulls, disturbed by Manu barking at them:

I spotted this blue heron from the road 

but by the time I stopped the car and grabbed my camera, he was getting airborne:

and gaining height:

 

An amazing bird

I had planned to get out and take some autumn pictures today, but it's been raining on and off all day. So here's a little dissertation on one of my favourite birds, the gorgeous kakapo (kah-kah-po). Douglas Adams (Hitchhiker's Guide...) described it as  

"a sort of big, fat, soft, fluffy, lugubrious bird."

There are 6 billion people on earth, but there are only 120 kakapo. Strigops habroptila is native to New Zealand, and is one of the rarest parrots in the world. It's flightless, it's nocturnal; it's the world's heaviest parrot.

It's possibly the longest living bird, and it has a subsonic mating boom that can travel several kilometres.

By 1995 there were only 50 known birds, surviving on several small island sanctuaries. Even today there are so few birds that each is named individually.Thanks to a campaign by the Department of Conservation and the work of dedicated people, the species has been brought back from the brink.

As you can see, they're herbivorous:

You can read about the recovery programme here.


 Richard Henry was the ‘elder statesman’ of the kakapo population,
and a lynchpin to the future of the species.

He was discovered in Fiordland in 1975, living more than 3500 feet above sea level, and was managed on islands for the remainder of his life. He  was thought to be around 80 years old when he died in December 2010. He had a crucial role to play in ensuring genetic diversity in the population. and his sons Sinbad and Gulliver have been important in fathering a number of birds who now make up the current
young adult population.

Douglas Adams again: the kakapo is "affectionate as a dog, playful as a kitten. It can inflate itself with air to become the size and shape of a football; it has a song like an unreleased collection of Pink Floyd studio out-takes; it smells like a musty clarinet case. The kakapo has had things its own way for so long, that it simply became -- eccentric."


I have never been lucky enough to see one of these fabulous
creatures, but I am determined to do so one day.

Alexia