WingedHearts.org More love than you thought possible

Butch, our 'first' pied butcherbird, who made friends with Gitie way back when Maggie was missing, and Gitie and I didn't know if he was alive or dead, and who cheered us up while we searched for Maggie, is ill. The last few days we've seen his eyes 'crust' up, and seeing is becoming progressively harder for him. We have been giving him bread soaked in antibiotics in the hope that it can help. Without catching him, there is nothing else we can do.  read more »

Larry the grey butcherbird has been having trouble from the new pied butcherbird group just up the road. When everyone else had been fed and had gone away, I sneaked out into the yard to look for Larry and the other grey butcherbirds.  read more »

We've had a very interesting week watching (and participating) in the relationships amongst our butcherbirds. On the back side of the house we have our original pied butcherbird family, Butch and Cass and two of their adult children. Along the road is a new pied butcherbird group of five or six, two of whom are two older kids of Butch and Cass, namely Teddy and Tommy, who, I am quite convinced once saved Gitie's life by warning her of a nearby highly venomous snake, and chasing it out of our yard.  read more »

Unfortunately our camera is on the fritz, just when you need it most!  read more »

Yesterday I was about to get in the car to go to town when an all-fired ruckus broke out behind the house. Running round, we saw a massive flock of galahs and rosellas and such birds crazily swirling here and there and crying out desperately as they wheeled here and there.

Then I noticed some hawk-like birds in amongst them. It was very hard to focus on them and get a clear view of exactly what they were, but it was clearly an attack upon the flock birds.  read more »

We are not sure what to think about our baby pied butcherbird, Chuckie.  read more »

Just to let you know about recent happenings with Maggie and Co, it's that time of year when the birds arrange their territories for the next twelve months. Not much action with our birds this year though (not yet, anyway). I got a clue that the Mags gang and Larry (grey butcherbird) gang have settled their quarrel. Last week, when I went up to the gate to call Larry, he and Maggie flew in side-by-side, then Maggie landed and Larry went to his nearby tree. But it was a definite signal to me that they are on amicable terms again.  read more »

Over the past few months, our birds' feathers have all generally improved - Vicky's, for example, have grown nicely where she had a bald spot for about six months. But our new adult magpie, Wendy, has surprised us. Slowly but surely, her off-white neck feathers have got whiter - whiter and whiter. Are we going to have to change Wendy's name to William?  read more »