Tuesday, December 6, 2011

World Bird Wednesday & Nature Notes - Farewell Biggles, hallo Egret


Biggles blundering in the bushes


or perched in the cherry tree or on my shoulder is but a sweet
memory. Last Saturday he was called to the Great Galah in the
sky. He had a misshapen tongue and yesterday there was another
dead baby galah on the paddock. Our resident flock of Galahs
nested away from home. Therefore they also could have ingested
pesticides on neighbouring farms. We steer clear of applying
chemicals on our land, it may look scruffier but at least we know
it is 'clean and green'. My neighbour with a property 4 times the
size of ours went on an aerial spraying spree against cockchafers
one year and we lost all the frogs in all our dams.


On a happier note, my first ever sighting of an Intermediate
Egret, Ardea intermedia, or any egret for that matter in our
area within the last 20+ years. I have only seen them on the
coast or much further north before.


Imagine my surprise when we crossed the Torrens river close
to its source in Mt.Pleasant. The footbridge made a great
vantage point while my ever lovin' trotted back to the car for
my camera. No zoom on the first shot to show you the habitat.


This one mainly for identification, the beak says it all, it is
yellow more than orange so it is in non-breeding plumage.

Our son was here for one night on his way to a shoot at a
steel plant so I was lucky enough to get an over breakfast
master class and will no longer be over exposing my whites,
well, providing I can surf the menu quickly enough!

Don't you just love the way birds have their knees bending
the other way from ours?


After fishing for ever so long, he decided to go mountain climbing.
I think he was just showing off as it would have been so much easier
to fly over those jutting rocks.


Finally, playing hide-and-seek in the bushes and giving a
perfect swan impression.



Enlarge them if you are so inclined . . .

Both these memes can be accessed from the relevant Logos on my side bar.
My thanks to Springman and Michelle for hosting them.
ah,

37 comments:

  1. sorry mr. biggles didn't make it! you definitely gave it a good try! the egret is very nice! especially if you don't get to see them locally!

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  2. Similar to the snowy egret that I posted but the snowy has yellow feet. Unfortunately you can barely detect the feet in my image on "Around California".

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  3. I love these shots.
    We have snowy egrets here, but I have never got a really clear shot of one.

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  4. A shame about Mr Biggles Arija.. a lovely bird to see.
    Your Egrets are beautiful to see and your images are fantastic.
    Many thanks for sharing them.
    Take care xx

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  5. love those shots of the Egret. :) It is so beautiful.

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  6. Arija, sorry about Mr Biggles. Your Egrets shots are all lovely and the habitat is pretty. Great shots, I hope you have awonderful day.

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  7. The Egret images are grand Arija, and so sorry about the little Biggles. I had the Blue Jay for 6 weeks a year ago and I shall never forget how much he seemed to desire living and yet...his journey was short lived, but he got a nice little burial in the garden~

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  8. Beautiful shots!! I think pesticides are outlawed here even on farms. Boom & Gary of the Vermilon River, Canada.

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  9. Beautiful egret photos! I'm glad you have the egret to help take away the sadness of the others. Too many humans care very little about wildlife and the impact they have on it.

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  10. Sorry about Mr. Biggles! Love the egrets! It really is too bad about the pesticides!! Your captures are always terrific, Arija! Hope your week is going well!

    Sylvia

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  11. Beautiful birds, I love your clear shots of them. We don't see anything like that where I live.

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  12. Somehow I thought you would be in a pesticide free area...but I guess not. When will we learn....

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  13. Wonderful photos of the Egret.They are such beautiful birds.

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  14. Sorry to hear about Biggles. Chemical spraying is so destructive to everything, and drifts where it's really not wanted. So unnecessary.
    The egret is a beauty.

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  15. Arija, so sorry to hear of the poor dead Biggles! I'm appalled to hear of the arial spraying! Are pesticides studied and rugulated over there? the loss of the frogs is shocking!

    As for your egret, it looks just lovely and exactly like our Great Egret over here. I suspect they are the same species, just with different names. Lovely shots you got. I love the close-up and the first one with the bird in its habitat and its reflection in the pool of water below.

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  16. So sad to hear about the galahs. The egrets are beautiful birds aren't they. We had a white faced heron in our own backyard earlier this week again. Beautiful birds.

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  17. Little Egrets started colonising Britain about twenty years ago and are now quite common. Other Egret species are also appearing occasionally. The "knees" are actually his ankles; he's standing on his toes and the real knees are hidden up in his feathers.

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  18. I am sorry about Biggles - so not such a happy ending after all. It's sad to read about the toxins that your neighbor spread on his fields. There'd be a great uproar here if an agricultural toxin is killing frogs! Frogs are playing the role of canaries in the mines. Your egrets are beautiful. It's easy to overexpose whites. I have a button on my camera to dial in neg EV (exposure compensation) which makes it easy, but I often forget to change it back to zero :-(

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  19. Beautiful photos, Arija! Wonderful!

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  20. What a treat! You must be stoked to have egrets in the area. They are a wonderful challenge to photograph, and my is your photography stepping up! It helps to have such an enchanting backdrop.
    I hope your frogs have returned!
    Cheers Arija!

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  21. So sad about the Galahs.

    Lovely shots of the Egret.

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  22. So sorry about the darn pesticides in your area -- that's just terrible to lose the wildlife that way.

    Your captures are so lovely -- I swear I felt calmer after viewing them. :)

    Have a wonderful day.

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  23. A very nice series of photos of the Egret. It's a shame more people don't think of the overall effect of the pesticides/poisons they use.

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  24. The Egret shot are just fabulous!

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  25. The egret shots are such a treat. Great post!

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  26. i would like to give you some cold if you send me some sun :)

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  27. I love the egrets and you have captured them so well! I also love how their knees bend!

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  28. We have egrets all the time and several types yet the setting you found yours in and the photo itself is outstanding. Well done. Thank you for the comment on my yardbirds. Everyone is remarking about the hawk yet I was more pleased with the sparrow shots. Oh well...

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  29. How exciting that you have egrets but disappinting that you have a neighbour who sprays pesticides!

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  30. Oh dear. I'm so sorry to hear about Biggles. Those pesticides sound very frightening.

    On a happier note, the egret is gorgeous! What a find. I'm sure he was posing and showing off for you!

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  31. So sad about the birdies :(
    Why do we humans always have to destroy nature? :(
    Ah, money, I forgot, grrr....

    Glad you have a little consolidation with the Egret!
    Lovely shots!
    And yep, learning something new is always great :D

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  32. Oh poor Biggles, but he did have a few minutes of joy. Gorgeous Egret. Everything is going your way.
    B.

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  33. It's so sad that Biggles didn't make it and the frogs are gone. I know the frustration of neighbors who spread poison everywhere. We had fewer frogs this year, and I blame the farm next door that switched from hay to corn. That takes spraying.

    On a happier note, the egret is gorgeous, and so are your photos of it!

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  34. Skaisti putni. Lieliskas fotogrāfijas. Un atkal tas brīnišķīgais rozā putns.

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  35. biggles is in a better place...
    thanks for updating. we can't save them all.
    lovelyl pics of the long legs

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