Spinfex Pigeons at the waterhole

I’ve been looking for the Spinifex Pigeon Geophaps plumifera around my part of the world for the past couple of years and, while camping at a waterhole an hour’s drive south of Yuendumu looking for the Peregrine Falcon I wrote about here a few weeks ago, I came across a small flock coming in to water and foraging around the rocky ridges on either side of the waterhole.

Spinifex Pigeons are Australian endemics and superbly adapted to life in the Australian arid zone – they are opportunistic breeders and nestlings are able to fly and forage for themselves within a week or so of hatching. Their cryptic plumage means that they blend into the rocky ridges and red soils that are their favoured breeding and foraging habitats.

One extraordinary adaption to life in the arid zone that Spinifex Pigeons share with the much smaller Diamond Dove Geopilia cuneata is the ability to forage through the hottest part of the day – what this means is that these birds can forage while their competitors are resting from the heat – similarly, they can forage while raptors aren’t out looking to eat them.

Wikipedia tells me that there are two races of Spinifex Pigeons in Australia – the White-bellied Spinifex Pigeon, Geophaps plumifera plumifera, (seen here) which is permanently found in the arid areas of north western, northern, eastern and central Australia, and the Red-bellied Spinifex Pigeon, Geophaps plumifera ferruginea, which is permanently found in the Pilbara, Western Australia.

I’ve got some more information on local Aboriginal knowledge about these birds but unfortunately left it at home at Yuendumu and didn’t bring it with me here to New Orleans, where I’m attending the 32nd annual conference of the Society of Ethnobiology at Tulane University in New Orleans – I’ll post a few short notes about that conference over the next few days.