Category: Birdwatching

The Chowchilla (Orthonyx spaldingii) is one of my favourite birds inhabiting the upland rainforest in the Paluma area. It is not a particularly large bird, nor does it have striking plumage. It does not build an elaborate bower like the numerous local bowerbirds and it does not have the impressive dance moves of the riflebird. 

BUT, the Chowchilla has a loud and unmistakeable call that echoes throughout the forest, usually at dawn and dusk. Any bird with a call like the Chowchilla demands your attention and admiration. Scientists report that their complex vocalisations vary quite markedly from place to place and there are identifiable local dialects. Imagine that – a unique Paluma Chowchilla language!

Chowchillas are also known as ‘logrunners’. They are ground dwelling birds, living and foraging in small family groups of between 3 to 8 birds. Each flock has their own permanent territory. Chowchillas spend most of their time foraging for invertebrates on the forest floor. They have strong legs for scratching in the leaf litter and their tail is used to support their body whilst they vigorously throw leaf litter aside.

Chowchillas are common in and around the village of Paluma. I see them regularly (or at least flashing glimpses of them) in the forest adjacent to the walking track to McClellands Lookout and along Lennox Crescent. They are regular visitors to the forest margins in my back garden.

I find them absolutely endearing for their elaborate songs and their lively and gregarious nature. When foraging as a family group they happily chatter away, enthusiastically intent on their search for food. They are oblivious that they are excavating precious garden beds and pot plants.

But, I have to admit that Chowchillas are the cause of considerable consternation and ongoing frustration for me!

For about two and a half years I have been trying to ‘capture’ a half decent photograph of a Chowchilla. Dozens and dozens of attempts and not one decent photograph!. Blurry, dark and unfocused images of Chowchillas are my speciality!

If I manage to find a bird within photographic range, it will rarely sit still for more than a split second and will surely move just at that moment when I press the shutter. Because the birds inhabit the forest floor, the light is usually poor and it is hard to see the bird clearly, let alone focus the camera.

I am well aware my frustration is shared by many fellow birdwatchers and photographers. ‘Photographing a Chowchilla’ is high on the wish list of many bird enthusiasts who visit Paluma, but it seems not many people actually achieve their goal.

So, after two and a half (long) years, this is my best effort at a Chowchilla photograph. Blurry, too dark, not centred and the bird is obscured by vegetation.  And I am sure that Chowchilla is grinning at me, just before it darts back into the cover of the rainforest foliage. I’ll keep trying……….!

Please let me know if you have had better success in capturing images of these beautiful, but very elusive birds in and around the Paluma area!

Text & (Blurry) Photo by Michele Bird

Brush Turkey       (Alectura lathami)

 It is time tribute was paid to the much maligned Brush Turkey, the scourge of Paluma gardeners. It is just as much a member of the local birdlife as the Riflebird, Catbird and Satin Bowerbird, and deserves to be acknowledged as such. Yet so often, visitors to Paluma do not give the turkey a second glance so intent are they in spotting the rarer birds.  On the other hand, some have mistaken the turkey’s identity and proudly report having seen a cassowary!

In spite of the curses bestowed on the turkey as he or she rummages through the garden, uprooting precious plants and redistributing carefully laid mulch, I suspect most people hold a sneaking affection for them.  I find them rather endearing. When I moved to Paluma, I inherited three who roosted in a tree in my back garden.  They waited each day at the back steps for breakfast scraps calling with their funny grunting clucks as they followed me to the edge of the forest where I put their food scraps out. Turkeys still have breakfast with me and are usually close by when I work in the garden.

At present the male turkeys are still dressed in the magnificent courtship plumage which they donned during spring when they felt the first pangs of love in the air, with bright yellow wattles hanging in fat coils from their crimson necks.  So take a moment to admire them as they strut their stuff through the village. They have been working tirelessly for many weeks, raking leaves, throwing aside sticks and twigs, to build nesting mounds which can cover an area of around two metres square and be up to a metre and a half high.

Their big feet, (Brush Turkeys are Megapodes – meaning ‘big feet’), are useful tools for raking leaves for their nesting mounds and for foraging for food amongst the leaf litter on the forest floor and in our gardens.

The mound completed, the male has to entice females to lay eggs in it; several hens will oblige – with eggs not necessarily fertilized by the builder of the mound. The hen’s job done, off she goes. She provides no parental care other than providing eggs with particularly rich yolk which can feed the chick after it has hatched. The male turkey will satisfy himself that the eggs are deeply buried in the mound.

The decomposition of the leaves and mulch with which the mounds are constructed provide the heat required to incubate the eggs. He keeps watch, turning the mulch to maintain a constant temperature until the chicks are ready to hatch, (after about 50 days), then off he will go, his job also done.

After the chick hatches it rests for several hours absorbing nutrients from the yolk reserve.  During this time its plumage dries and its lungs fill with air. Then it has to work its way out of the mound, an effort that takes on average, 40 hours. It will rest frequently, making a small cavity around itself which allows it to breathe. Once out of the mound, always during daylight hours, the chick has to fend for itself, making its way quickly to the shelter of shrubbery or vine thickets before dark to avoid predators such as dingoes, owls, pythons, carnivorous marsupials and feral cats. The chicks know instinctively to feed on grubs and insects in the leaf litter.

New chicks with their fluffy brown feathers and weighing only about 150 grams, are seldom seen: partly because they gain black feathers at only a few weeks old, partly because they stay concealed within the forest until they are near adult size, (at around 8 months old), but mainly because so many of them do not survive the first few months, falling victim to predators.  A hen can lay up to 24 eggs in a season but sadly, of every 200 eggs laid only one will reach adulthood.

So; Salute the Brush Turkey – a battler and survivor.

For more reading, an excellent article on the Brush Turkey written by Dr Ann Goth may be found in Nature Australia (Spring 2005, Volume 28, Number 6).

Article by Colwyn Campbell & Turkey Photos by Michele Bird

Update on Riflebird Courtship at Paluma

In a previous post (5 November 2018) I reported on the frenetic courtship activity of the Victoria’s Riflebird at Paluma during the height of the breeding season for these birds. I noted that many of the juvenile male birds were practising their skills at displaying for females.

While the young males continue to compete for the attention of females,  the adult male birds are also displaying with all the finesse that maturity brings. I captured the elaborate courtship display of one adult male bird who managed to win over his female companion. The courtship ritual and display lasted for almost 10 minutes and was a sight to behold.

1. The adult male arrives and sits on his perch, scanning the forest canopy and calling in a loud raucous voice.

2. A female bird arrives and sits in a nearby tree. He is instantly alert and almost appears to take a bow in her direction.

3. He leaves his perch and flies into the nearby canopy to join her, sitting next to her on a branch. He puffs-up his whole body, raises his wings and the performance begins.

4. He displays frantically over and over with raised flapping wings until he has her full attention. She was looking quite disinterested for a time as the photographs show!.

5. Finally he has her full attention and they copulate. No photographs included here, privacy please!

6. He then flies back to his original perch and turns to display again, raising his wings in the direction of the female who is still sitting in the canopy.

What an amazing and remarkable bird and a truly memorable 10 minutes of my life!   Right place at the right time.  Or, just another day in the paradise called Paluma.

Article & Photographs by Michele Bird (no pun intended).