Eater-of-all-the-budgerigars is another name for the King Brown, he climbs up to get at them in a bloodwood tree, for example, or in a ghost gum, in a hollow. He puts his mouth into the hollow and then eats up all the little budgerigars.
READ MOREDecember, 2008
Ten Questions for Paul Kelly
I caught up with Paul Kelly recently and asked him a few questions…including: Tell me something you’ve never told anyone else before. PK – No!
READ MOREWhy the NT needs an independent Police & Corruption watchdog…Part 1
The NT Ombudsman’s Report for 2007/2008 details a pretty good justification why the NT needs a standing Commission to conduct independent investigations of misconduct by the NT Police, politicians and government agencies.
READ MOREChina – not a good place to be a bird…or a birder
China is not a good place to be a bird…The Li men jostle to sell me supper, all of it live: white-breasted waterhens, little egrets, a black-crowned night heron and a spot-billed duck, the only duck where male and female look alike.
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Ten (thirteen really) questions for…Shane Marshall
Bob Gosford – Tell me something you’ve never told anyone before.
Shane Marshall – My parents sent me to school on St Patrick’s Day when I was in Prep. school because they didn’t believe it was a holiday. I sat in the playground and cried and then went to the lady that lived across the road.
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Flesh-eating Mice, the Tristan Albatross and looming extinction
“We had no idea that mice could do this sort of thing.” Swarms of 10 mice at a time can be seen gnawing at the chicks’ bodies.
READ MORE“Ju-Ju” markets and birds in African magico-medicinal use
These market stalls contain “an assembly of skulls and skins arranged in a powerful, if often rather disturbing, display that can include horse and hyena heads, crocodiles, dried snakes and monkey skulls. The presence of so much decomposing flesh, crudely preserved with only ash or salt, makes for a very unhealthy background odour and a super-abundance of flies.
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Web censorship vigilantes rule in the UK…and Australia
Will the the rise and relentless rise of the web vigilante kill the web and eat its children? Recent developments in the UK indicate that over-reactions by self-appointed cyber-nannys and ISPs can seriously disrupt innocent web use.
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First Dog – you call that a spider? – THIS is a Spider!!
Over at First Dog he is talking about a bunch of Spiders – most particularly the Black House Spider (Badumna insignis) that he found around his Dad’s house outside of Canberra somewhere…let round one of the My-spider-is bigger-and-nastier-looking-than-your-spider battle commence! A couple of weeks ago I was doing my usual morning dog-shit patrol (always amazed when [...]
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Snake of the Week – Desert Death Adder Acanthophis pyrrhus
We saw this beautiful snake earlier this year in a creekbed in the borefield 15 or so kilometres west of town. Last Sunday afternoon one of its relatives killed one of our favourite little dogs, Boot-boots.
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