Part twenty-four : RAIN and now SUNSHINE

Well, I'll eat my words! In the January/February Newsletter I queried the FULL ON wet season, or lack thereof, and now in the April edition I can confirm that we have been blessed this year with adequate wetness (the mould in our cupboards and on our walls and clothes comes for free, along with the damp air!). Although daffy Dylan did not eventuate as a cyclone, he maybe helped to draw the recalcitrant monsoon down to our part of the tropics. We have had a really wonderful six weeks of rain, rain and more rain*. (Is it only that long? It seems to have been wet forever! How soon we forget!!).
* This was actually written on 5 March.

Now, an explanation may be a good thing at this point. I am no expert on birds/animals/climate (or anything else for that matter), nor am I part of the twitcher mob. Those aficionados are a little bit beyond my comprehension, although I do acknowledge their usefulness in the name of science. I am merely a "nature observer in my own backyard", making bird/animal behavioural and climate notations, referring to experts where and when available, while writing my own ideas, thoughts and observation for this publication.
Please feel free to contradict me and/or add to my knowledge by contacting me through the editor.

Now – some bird gossip. After Christmas I happened upon a small, white, ornamental bird cage (in the reduced-for-quick-sale trolley!) and it has proved to be an ideal dove-proof finch-feeder. With a plastic plate on the bottom sprinkled with suitably enticing seed, it not only attracted the finches which could easily flit through the bars, but prevented the greedy, opportunistic bar-shouldered doves from getting more than their fair share.

The crimson-headed finches, so prolific prior to the debilitating heat during the Christmas/New Year period, returned en masse. They would announce their arrival with a high-pitched tee-tee-tee sound and continually flick their long slender tails as they pecked at the seeds. Later, the miniature owl look-alikes, the tiny double-bar finches were also gleefully hopping in and out of the cage.

For a while it appeared that it was to be sole occupancy by breed-type only – sharing with others of the species just did not compute! Dining hours were apparently strictly allocated and adhered to. Breakfast, 8am to 11am, and the crimson finches held sway, whole families at times: mums, dads, kids, cousins and aunties too! They vacated the food bowl just after 11am, and the pretty, little double-bars were permitted to partake of lunch until about 1.30pm. Then they all just disappeared for their afternoon siesta until the brilliant crimson heads appeared again at about 4.30pm, once more tweeting

loudly. At about 5.30pm the double-bars would double back for either second helpings or leftovers. Or maybe canapés!

However, during the worst of the weather, both species would fly in, seemingly for respite from the buffeting winds and rain squalls of the monsoonal extremes. Just a little bit of R, R&R: Rest, Repast and Recreation! Eventually they declared a truce and agreed to share if their designated feeding times overlapped. Now they happily feed side-by-side in the "White Cage café".

It was somewhat pathetic, but at the same time quite comical, to watch the doves trying to push their heads through the bars of the new finch feeder to get at the seeds, while at the same time trying to imitate the humming bird's trick of hovering (while collecting pollen). The manoeuvre failed miserably. All they managed to do was send the finches skittering away in fright as the cage rocked and swayed, spilling seed on the ground. However, the doves soon became reconciled to picking up the "crumbs" the finches had managed to eject, and they really didn't miss out on anything. They just had to change their way of thinking and become floor scavengers rather than free-loaders.