Recent 45cm Pied Butcherbird sighting

Back on the 27th March 2013 at 3:18PM my brother and I had stopped at the bridge on Douglas Street to look at the water in the creek. We were just standing there looking at everything and I had my camera ready to take photos of anything I could see that might suddenly show up, like a duck. Moments later, out of the corner of my eye I saw something very close to us to our left up in the air, and it was flying very fast. Without any sound this large bird flew over the bridge avoiding my brother and I and flew like crazy as if it was chasing something. I didn't see anything in front of the bird. It wasn't until it was about a second or two after sighting it as it was flying away along the creekbank that I could identify it as the 45cm Pied Butcherbird. I could barely keep my eyes on it - it flew that fast.

As I watched, moving quickly and suddenly to keep my eyes on this bird, it flew straight across the bridge then zigzagged right to left, then suddenly dove down to the ground. I never saw it come back up again and lost sight of the bird at this point. It is possible the Pied Butcherbird continued flying rather than diving to the ground, as it was flying a lot lower (about 5-15 metres above the ground at this point) the further away it was from the bridge. I lost sight of the bird at about 100 metres from where I stood on the bridge.

The thing that surprised me the most was it's speed. I've seen Australian Magpies fly in 2 separate speeds, the normal speed and a hurried speed. This Pied Butcherbird easily flew faster than a Magpie's hurried speed (or top speed).

I did manage to take a photo of the Pied Butcherbird flying passed but the photo came out all blurry. It's too blurry to post and it didn't even have the bird in it, and I had the camera pointed too far to the right.

This Pied Butcherbird is turning out to be a really difficult fellow to photograph. But I am glad it is still in the area even though I do not see it very often.

I doubt this is a Noisy Friarbird

Way back on the 21st December 2012 at 10:28AM I heard a very strange noise. It was the noise of a Noisy Friarbird, so I've learnt through researching this bird's call. But thinking about this bird, whatever it was, was here just 3 days after the 45cm Pied Butcherbird arrived in the area. In all my time I have never heard this type of bird call before, and have not heard it since. It does sound somewhat remotely similiar to some of the sounds the Pied Currawongs make though.

The bird in the video was about the size of the 45cm Pied Butcherbird, and may have actually been the Pied Butcherbird for several reasons.

1. I have never seen nor heard a Noisy Friarbird in Tenterfield and I've been here since 1995.
2. The juvenile Pied Butcherbird, being new to the area and lost, made lots of different calls during the first month it was here. It appeared it be distressed and frightened and was alone dispite it's parent looking for it.
3. The Pied Butcherbird juvenile is able to mimic the sounds of an Eastern Koel and other bird species quite accurately even at a very young age.
4. This bird was being attacked by smaller birds which is what happened to the Pied Butcherbird when it arrived. It seems only the larger birds are attacked by smaller birds. Normal sized Pied Butcherbirds are not attacked by small birds in the area. I haven't seen it occur anyway.
5. During the first few weeks of the Pied Butcherbird being here it flew frantically across Tenterfield making all kinds of noises. It was the most distinctive and vocal bird in the area at the time.
6. If this bird were indeed a Noisy Friarbird it would have at least stayed in the area overnight before moving on. It's call would have been heard more often and I may have actually seen the bird.
7. This bird was behaving like it was lost and frightened rather than just passing through town.

I honestly believe that this is the distress call of the Pied Butcherbird juvenile. I remember listening to this bird for several hours straight and felt totally sad that it was lost and in distress. I heard it call out like this for most of that day, relentlessly calling out in hope to be heard. I hoped that it's parents would hear it calling out but they never did. It's plight to be heard by it's parents seemed futile but it hung around the area. This bird was relentless in everything it done.

It wasn't until about week 3 that I believe the bird gave up and decided it would never see it's parents again and was homeless. So it began to settle down and got on with more important things in it's life. Those 3 weeks must've been torture for the bird as no other bird gave it peace nor comfort. No bird adopted it either. And no bird stopped chasing and attacking it when it was distressed. But the last time I saw this bird it wasn't being attacked by anything. Birds left it alone.

Why the bird had been separated from it's parents is anyone's guess really. Perhaps a raptor chased it but couldn't catch it and the bird kept flying as it was so scared until it found itself lost in Tenterfield? All I know it is not a bird from Tenterfield as there are no extremely large Pied Butcherbirds here.

I cannot help but think that if this bird becomes a parent, which it will in time, it will be very protective of it's chick/s. For some reason I think it will not let it's chicks go through what it went through. But I'm just guessing here, as I really don't know how birds react in this situation with their own chicks.

What do birds do when it is a hot Summers' day?

What do birds do when its too hot? Not much really. All the birds tend to sit in the trees somewhere in a shady spot and just rest for hours on end. I've observed a few different species during the hot weather, so I will write about them.

EASTERN ROSELLAS

Eastern Rosellas generally talk a lot when it is quite hot outside. They tend to sit just below the upper leaves of a tree's branches - if its a small tree - or in the top 1/3 part of a large gum tree. They tend to rest from about 12 noon until 5PM without moving from the tree or eating/drinking.

Here is an example of a male Eastern Rosella. The male was looking out for danger whilst his mate was in the next tree to the left. My brother got a bit too close to the tree where they both were seen together in, and they flew out of that tree into separate trees.


When I first spotted the male in a different tree....

Then he began to slouch down so I couldn't see him.

With Eastern Rosellas it is pointless trying to photograph them when it is hot. They hide themselves really well in the canopy of the tree they are in, and actually hide themselves behind leaves. On a separate day I searched for 15 minutes trying to spot a pair of Eastern Rosellas (the same individual and his mate as in these photos) in a small tree I was standing underneath, and I could not see them. I could hear them but that was about it.

LAUGHING KOOKABURRAS

A baby Laughing Kookaburra. Photo taken on 17 february 2013

This photo was taken at 2:49PM and the Kookaburra's parent was hiding in the tree canopy of a smaller gum tree to the left of this tree. The young Kookaburra was exposed in this tree, on a low branch probably about 8-10 feet off the ground. It was a hot day, probably about 37 plus degrees celcius. My brother and I were walking home from doing some shopping in town at the time. We were on the other side of the road when I took some photos of this baby Kookaburra. Only when I spoke to the Kookaburra asking it where it's parents were did the parent respond by giving off a quiet Kookaburra laugh for about 10 seconds then it went quiet. As if to say I'm over here in this tree and I am watching you!

PIED BUTCHERBIRDS

This video above is of the sounds of a Pied Butcherbird during a very hot day and it is mimicking the sounds of an Eastern Koel. The Pied Butcherbird stayed in the tree the longest and was in the tree for more than 5 hours before it flew away. The tree in which this Pied Butcherbird was in was the large Eucalypt tree. I could not see the bird as it hid well amongst the tree branches. I did not want to scare this bird from the tree even though it was really high above the ground, so I stayed on the verandah. If I moved toward the gum tree on the ground the bird would fly to another tree as I tried that prior to the filming of this video.

This particular Pied Butcherbird is the same 45cm Pied Butcherbird I've previously written about on this site.

AUSTRALIAN MAGPIES

Australian Magpie

This photo was taken on 13 October 2012 at 11:39AM. It was a really hot morning and day in general. For about a week between 1 - 4 Magpies hung around my neighbour Carol's front yard in the shade of this particular slow growing tree. The Magpie was about half way up the tree in the shade. Sometimes when Australian Magpies are resting from the heat they will quietly sing but most times they are quiet and just observant of what is going on around them. The juveniles are the ones that sing quietly when it is hot. Magpies usually rest in the trees from around 12 noon until about 3-4PM. Juveniles stay in the trees about 1/2 an hour longer than the adults do and only hunger will make them move out of the tree/s.

MEGAFAUNA - The 45cm Pied Butcherbird sings like an Eastern Koel

A very interesting development has occurred and I am glad I was able to observe it. For months now I thought a Pacific (Eastern) Koel was hanging around, calling out even calling during the night. But today I saw what looked like a large white fronted bird on the fence across the road making the exact same sound as an Eastern Koel. I was not able to focus my camera quick enough to even get a photo. It certainly was not an Eastern Koel and only 2 species fit into the size category of what it could be: a Laughing Kookaburra and the 45cm Pied Butcherbird. It was not a Laughing Kookaburra. Kookaburras don't mimic sounds they hear. The bird in question was actually the large 45cm Pied Butcherbird.

However going back to when I first saw this 45cm Pied Butcherbird I remember it making all kinds of songs. I recorded what I thought was (until today) an Eastern Koel (The Koels that are in NSW anyway) but thought it strange as it was doing a lot of mimicry sounds. I've several videos like this taken in the last 3-4 or so weeks but one in particular I will add here (or to another post) as soon as I can find it on my pc.

This particular Pied Butcherbird is really hard to photograph. It seems to know when someone is taking it's photo and hides deeper into the tree canopy and goes quiet. It hides in the tree tops during the hottest parts of the day, and is impossible to see as it uses the outer leaves/branches as camouflage. It does call out and makes lots of sounds, which sounds like an Eastern Koel. When it is out feeding it doesn't keep still long enough to take a decent photo of it. it flies around town a lot but often I can't track it by it's calls. It seems to land on something and then call out. For most of the time it is quiet, especially during the first half of the day, but then it gets a bit vocal from about lunch time onwards.

The Pied Butcherbird sounds I've been hearing lately, especially today, tells me there are two of these birds in the area. I have no idea on the size of the other Pied Butcherbird but it's voice is the same but a little bit quieter. I heard them both calling out to each other from two different trees, at least 50 metres apart.

If these birds are coming together to breed then I need to keep a close eye on where they are coming and going to. But as the one I have seen, which I think might be a male, has attracted the female to his area it is possible I might get to see some nesting behaviour in the near future. I cannot be certain though that the two birds will even hang around the area to nest. They might move further away from the outskirts of town where it is peaceful and much quieter.

For two days in a row now the male? has been sighted across the road on the fence around 5pm. Tomorrow I will be prepared and hopefully get a video of the bird. Hopefully it will sing for me - wishful thinking on my part!

If nothing else it will be interesting to see what their chicks will be like and how big the female is. Or to at least get some decent footage of this male? bird.

MEGAFAUNA - The 45cm Grey Butcherbird is actually a Pied Butcherbird

MEGAFAUNA MEANS REALLY LARGE. However, it seems that some species of birds are getting larger and during the month of December 2012 I have seen 3 individuals of 3 separate species that are larger than normal. This post is about my first sighting - of a large Grey Butcherbird juvenile.

I was out the front taking photographs two days ago when I spotted a bird on the fence across the road. So I took a photo of it. It's of the oversized Grey Butcherbird again. That's what I first thought but looking at the bird now I've re-identified it as a Pied Butcherbird. The photos below shows how the bird has developed it's grey colouring over the passed month. It's colouring is not the same as in the video I took of it when I first spotted this bird back in December 2012. It's feathers are a really dark grey now and it's head is turning very dark grey too.

Click the photos to enlarge them.

Screenshot from video taken 18 December 2012.
The bird on a standard Hills Rotary clothesline.
This is what the bird looked like when I first
saw it.

The large Pied Butcherbird in the misty rain.

It is a sight to see this bird because it is so huge. With ex-tropical cyclone Oswald been and gone over Tenterfield, this and many other birds began to come back to the area 2 days ago (29 Jan. 2013) in the late afternoon. I only saw this Butcherbird for a few moments and didn't have the chance to take a second photo of it. I am happy to see this bird again as I know it has been hanging around the area since it first got here in December 2012.

Grey nor Pied Butcherbirds rarely beg for food from humans. They used to but not any more. Obviously their dependence on humans for food is obsolete and as a result nature has resumed it's course. With nature taking over and the birds fending for themselves and trying to find food the result is a much larger Pied Butcherbird species.

Whilst adding the first picture to this post, that the bird was on the clothesline in the photo, I decided to measure the length between each line whilst writing up this post. Then I came up with a more accurate length of this bird in real time. The Pied Butcherbird is approximately 1 and 3/4 lengths of one section of the clothesline when it's head is upright. One length is the distance between two horizontal green cords of the clothesline - that you hang clothes from. I'm actually guessing the bird is just under 1 and 3/4 lengths of the clothesline actually. The length between 3 cords (2 gaps in the clothesline where you'd hang clothes) is approximately 20.5 inches (give or takes 1-2 cms - the clothesline was wound up and I had trouble reaching it). Half that is 10.25 inches, half that is 5.125 inches, and half that again is 2.5625 inches.

The bird is approximately 3/4 of the total length of 20.5 inches. Therefore the Math is:

  10.25 inches
    5.125 inches
 + 2.5625 inches
------------------
  17.6875 inches (or about 45 cms) in length.

When the bird has it's head stretched out horizontally it is approximately 52 cms in length. N.B. The bird is not fully mature and am uncertain if it is still growing.

Pied Butcherbird details found on BirdsinBackyards website:

Minimum Size: 33cm

Maximum Size: 38cm

Average size: 35cm

A better screenshot from video taken 18 Dec. 2012.
The Grey Fantail in question that tried attacking it.

Now, if you think I am pulling the wool over your eyes and exaggerating on this bird's size, then come to Tenterfield and see it for yourself. It might take you a long while to find this particular bird as it moves around a lot but eventually you will see it. I am not exaggerating about this bird's size. I may be out by a few centimetres but that's about it. Pied Butcherbirds are not naturally about 45-52 cms in length, here or anywhere else in Australia but this particular bird is!

This is the beginning of climate change adaptations of birds in New South Wales. How large Pied Butcherbirds will become in the future is anyone's guess.

MEGAFAUNA - A 45cm Grey Butcherbird chick lost and alone

MEGAFAUNA MEANS REALLY LARGE. However, it seems that some species of birds are getting larger and during the month of December 2012 I have seen 3 individuals of 3 separate species that are larger than normal. This post is about my first sighting - of a large Grey Butcherbird juvenile.

My first sighting of this bird was on the 18th December 2012 at 9:03AM when I took this video. The bird happened to land on my neighbour Carol's clothes line then was attacked by a young Grey Fantail. Grey Butcherbirds are 24-30 centimetres in length and Pied Butcherbirds are on average 32cms in length. Pied Butcherbirds are common in Tenterfield and they are relatively small but Grey Butcherbirds are not common here anymore. They are both smaller than the local Australian Magpies.

This young juvenile bird was much larger than a standard sized Grey Butcherbird. It was the size of a Laughing Kookaburra - 45cms in length. This larger than normal young chick has been flying around the area frantically calling out to it's parents and continued to do so for more than a week afterward. Why it was separated from it's parents is anyone's guess. It is, I believe, still in the area as of 10th January 2012 (today). The bird appears to be able to fend for itself but it does not like being chased by smaller birds. I have not seen an adult Grey Butcherbird in the area since this video was taken on the 19th December 2012. The last time I saw an adult Grey Butcherbird was about 12 months ago.

N.B. 31 January 2013 - This is actually a Pied Butcherbird not a Grey Butcherbird.