Post by Verbivore on Aug 20, 2008 10:36:01 GMT
And another Banfield sample ...
Morning on Dunk Island
At this season of the year, when resident birds are reinforced by admired migrants, food of all kinds seems to be supplied in superabundance.
The struggle for existence is, apparently, never very keen, and, when food is produced beyond requirement, birds have leisure, and their voices of love and joy in living make the morning glad.
Let me catalogue the makers of the sounds of this sunny, placid hour between seven and eight in the morning.
Just at the window, with outspreading branches almost tapping the panes, is a lemon tree -- yellow fruit, green leaves. Dusky honey-eaters have been living among the flowers, but not half so active as the sun-birds. These little sprites perform all sorts of topsy-turvy gymnastics, displaying olive-green backs, breasts of burnished yellow, and bibs of royal blue, in their eager search for honey and the minute insects which seek sanctuary within the flowers.
Fascinated honey-eaters have visited the same tree and have complained in piping tones of having been forestalled, and the beautiful varied honey-eater has shouted out his exclamations in full-throated ease.
One of the strongest personalities among the birds of the morning is the spangled drongo, which is so buoyant with the ecstacies of life that it soars in an acute angle up into the cloudless Northern sky, meanwhile uttering a crescendo clinking. Then it hurls itself earthwards, stuttering as it falls, and glides to the topmost branches of an adjacent tree, there to clink and call in almost demure tones.
Many swamp pheasants are saluting the sun with melodious whoops, and many more scrub hens are crowing and cackling with great vigor.
Sulphur-crested cockatoos, now making their way to the mainland, have been screeching and calling for more than half an hour. They have their definite roosting places, but at daybreak disperse for breakfast and assemble prior to the daily flight to Queensland.
Those earliest on the wing return, and, with untuneful remonstrances, chide the lazy ones of the flock, and coax them away from the attractions of the moment.
A bare list of pigeons will suffice. Most conspicuous of all in appearance and call is the nutmeg pigeon which arrives from Papua and the Malay Straits during the first week of August. It is a haughty bird with a rapid note.
The tranquil dove has been cooing pleasantly in the lemon trees a little further away, and, before sunrise, a solitary green pigeon uttered its doleful cry as it paraded the path leading to the kitchen door, on the look-out for crumbs.
Noonan. M (Ed.) (1989). 'Morning on Dunk Island', in The Gentle Art of Beachcombing: A collection of writings by EJ Banfield. Brisbane: University of Queensland Press. pp. 67-8
Morning on Dunk Island
At this season of the year, when resident birds are reinforced by admired migrants, food of all kinds seems to be supplied in superabundance.
The struggle for existence is, apparently, never very keen, and, when food is produced beyond requirement, birds have leisure, and their voices of love and joy in living make the morning glad.
Let me catalogue the makers of the sounds of this sunny, placid hour between seven and eight in the morning.
Just at the window, with outspreading branches almost tapping the panes, is a lemon tree -- yellow fruit, green leaves. Dusky honey-eaters have been living among the flowers, but not half so active as the sun-birds. These little sprites perform all sorts of topsy-turvy gymnastics, displaying olive-green backs, breasts of burnished yellow, and bibs of royal blue, in their eager search for honey and the minute insects which seek sanctuary within the flowers.
Fascinated honey-eaters have visited the same tree and have complained in piping tones of having been forestalled, and the beautiful varied honey-eater has shouted out his exclamations in full-throated ease.
One of the strongest personalities among the birds of the morning is the spangled drongo, which is so buoyant with the ecstacies of life that it soars in an acute angle up into the cloudless Northern sky, meanwhile uttering a crescendo clinking. Then it hurls itself earthwards, stuttering as it falls, and glides to the topmost branches of an adjacent tree, there to clink and call in almost demure tones.
Many swamp pheasants are saluting the sun with melodious whoops, and many more scrub hens are crowing and cackling with great vigor.
Sulphur-crested cockatoos, now making their way to the mainland, have been screeching and calling for more than half an hour. They have their definite roosting places, but at daybreak disperse for breakfast and assemble prior to the daily flight to Queensland.
Those earliest on the wing return, and, with untuneful remonstrances, chide the lazy ones of the flock, and coax them away from the attractions of the moment.
A bare list of pigeons will suffice. Most conspicuous of all in appearance and call is the nutmeg pigeon which arrives from Papua and the Malay Straits during the first week of August. It is a haughty bird with a rapid note.
The tranquil dove has been cooing pleasantly in the lemon trees a little further away, and, before sunrise, a solitary green pigeon uttered its doleful cry as it paraded the path leading to the kitchen door, on the look-out for crumbs.
Noonan. M (Ed.) (1989). 'Morning on Dunk Island', in The Gentle Art of Beachcombing: A collection of writings by EJ Banfield. Brisbane: University of Queensland Press. pp. 67-8