Animal Antics

 

 Random acts of kindness. Kindness is a quality that shows you… | by Waleed  Tariq | Medium

 

 Ancient black swans hunted to extinction, NZ's swans from ...

                              

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1961 comments

Thanks Celia ... intriguing creatures.

27 April – World Tapir Day

World Tapir Day exists to raise awareness about the species of tapir that inhabit Central and South America and Southeast Asia and to raise funds to purchase land to protect it from human encroachment.

More.

Mirror, signal, mane-oeuvre! Lion is pictured looking ready for a roaring ride around safari park Mirror, signal, mane-oeuvre! Lion is pictured looking ready for a roaring ride around

Settling down behind the wheel of a jeep, this lion looks ready for a roaring ride around a safari park. In fact there was no cause for alarm at the Siky Park zoo in Switzerland - Zumba was merely exploring his enclosure when he popped his head through the back window of the empty car used as a distraction for him and his mate Timba. The moment was captured by photographer Emmanuel Keller, who said: 'To me it looks like Zumba is driving around in his off-road car to impress his wife Timba.' Zumba had just enjoyed some lunch too if the bloodstains on his chin are anything to go by.

Handsome devil!

MOD faces questions over war games exercise off the Scottish coast after several whales washed up dead on local beaches suffering from the bends MOD faces questions over war games exercise off Scottish coast after several whales washed

Scientists who tracked the Joint Warrior Nato war games, the largest in Europe, recorded an alarming number of sonar contacts over several days. The noise was so loud that on occasions members of the Hebridean Whale and Dolphin Trust (HDWT) could hear the sound coming from headphones left in a neighbouring room. The research comes as the MoD is being asked to explain the mysterious deaths of several deep diving whales washed ashore around Scotland and that have suffered from the bends. The MoD is being specifically asked if naval sonar used in the recent war games was responsible. Pictured: Left, a stranded beaked whale at Kearvaig Bag on June 10. Right, A bottlenose whale at Faslane in Gare Loch on October 1.

 

How tragic, I believe that sonar is causing real problems for whales, maybe this is why they wash up on shore their nervous system and hearing is effected.

 

Poor things.

Unfortunately for many whales, dolphins and other marine life, the use of underwater sonar can lead to injury and even death. Sonar systems—first developed by the U.S. Navy to detect enemy submarines—generate slow-rolling sound waves topping out at around 235 decibels; the world’s loudest rock bands top out at only 130. These sound waves can travel for hundreds of miles under water, and can retain an intensity of 140 decibels as far as 300 miles from their source.

These rolling walls of noise are no doubt too much for some marine wildlife. While little is known about any direct physiological effects of sonar waves on marine species, evidence shows that whales will swim hundreds of miles, rapidly change their depth (sometime leading to bleeding from the eyes and ears), and even beach themselves to get away from the sounds of sonar.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/does-military-sonar-kill/

More here ...

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2018.2533

Thanks for the info RnR, seems like this could be the reason we see whales beaching what another tragic thing that humans have caused.

.Celia,

I am not at all techno savy on YLC, but would love to share "Snowball the dancing cockatoo" with members.  He is quite amazing, and experts have determined 22 different dance moves.

Would you be so very kind as to download the link/s?

Thank you

 

Here it is Twyla, sorry Celia, just saved you some time, getting good at this lol

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7IZmRnAo6s

And yes he is a good dancing cockatoo, must love music.

:) Very clever dancer ... lovely to see.

Thanks Incognito.

Thank you so much, Incognito.

You are a sweetie.

 

There are quite a number of different songs Snowball dances to.

Birds are highly intelligent ... so much research and writing has been done on this.

An owner of an African Grey wrote about how it understood language so well.  They had a dog, which the bird disliked.  It would yell "the dogs coming upstairs" ... then "the dogs upstairs!!".

Birds also bond very well with humans.

I have never liked birds in cages (except I suppose canaries would not survive outside of one) 

Years ago when the children were small, a magpie and a pigeon adopted us.  We never fed them, so it wasn't opportunistic.

When my husband was working under the car, the magpie, 'Bruce', would get under with him.  When my daughter was waiting across road for the school bus, he would wait with her, and when she boarded the bus, he would fly on top of it and ride to the end of the road, then fly back.

The pigeon, 'Walter', would dive into the house whenever I opened the door. He loved to sit in one of the baskets I had on my bookcase. He often stayed to watch TV, sitting on my son's knee.  We became very worried when his feathers all went "spikey" and took him to the vet, who told us, 'no more tv time" as it had put 'Walter's' bio-clock all out ... the seasonal rythm.

 

 

What a lovely story about Bruce and Walter, thank you for sharing Twyla.

Just had time to sit down and read a bit and Twyla's story of the school bus, that was lovely, Bruce had the right equipment for that! 

Poor Walter, did he miss his TV visits Twyla?

Many scientists think corvids - the family of birds that includes crows, ravens, rooks and jays - may be among the most intelligent animals on earth, based on their ability to solve problems, make tools and apparently consider both possible future events and other individuals states of mind ..                                                               www.smh.com.au/animals/Crows may be as intelligent as apes, scientists say (June 24, 2015)

www.statnews.com/Crows possess higher intelligence long thought primarily human  (2020/09/24)

There are a number of online sites demonstrating corvid IQ.

 

I have heard about the crows and ravens, they sure have a lot of confidence too.

 

 

 

 

 

  The Ravens at the Tower of London - Picture of Yourwaytours, London -  TripadvisorThe ravens | Tower of London | Historic Royal Palaces

A group[a] of at least six captive ravens are resident at the Tower of London.[3] Their presence is traditionally believed to protect The Crown and the Tower; a superstition holds that "if the Tower of London ravens are lost or fly away, the Crown will fall and Britain with it."[4] Some historians, including the Tower's official historian believe the "Tower's raven mythology is likely to be a Victorian flight of fantasy".[5] The earliest known reference to captive ravens at the Tower is an illustration from 1883.[6]

Historically, wild ravens were common throughout Britain, even in towns, the Tower being within their natural range. When they were exterminated from much of their traditional range, including London, they could only exist at the Tower in captivity and with official support. The Tower ravens are tended to by the Ravenmaster of the Yeomen Warders. Local legend puts the origin of the captive raven population at the time of King Charles II (reigned 1660–85). Some of the ravens at the Tower were specially bred in Somerset.[1][7]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ravens_of_the_Tower_of_London

 https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/tower-london-welcomes-baby-ravens-first-time-30-years-180972252/

583314-ravenmaster.jpg

All four chicks are growing quickly, quadrupling in size from around 8 centimeters tall at birth to more than 30 centimeters last week (Courtesy of Ravenmaster Chris Skaife)

 Sun calls on patriotic Brits to save the Tower of London's ravens & keep  the monarchy from falling

 

 Sweary Tower of London ravens 'tell schoolchildren to "b****r off", steal  Pringles and learn to play Kerplunk' - Mirror Online

 

 

Interesting, good they are breeding again.

 

As Children visiting the 'Tower' we were told all gruesome stories of beheadings, but the one that I remembered was if the Cravens left the Tower the country will fall!

Yes, it's OK to feed wild birds in your garden – as long as it's the right food

The Conversation / 

By Darryl Jones

Posted FriFriday 16 MarMarch 2018 at 1:07pmPink and grey bird on branch with wings extendedWe should have a more meaningful discussion about the pros and cons of feeding wild birds in Australia.(ABC Open Contributor Kyliessv)Share 

Many Australians feed wild birds in their gardens, yet the practice is discouraged by many bird groups and governments.

That's in stark contrast to what's encouraged in other countries, so what should we be doing?

It's an issue I studied in detail for my new book The Birds At My Table: Why We Feed Wild Birds and Why it Matters.

But first, let's look at what happened when a sudden cold snap gripped parts of the Northern Hemisphere recently.

This provides a clear example of a positive relationship between birds and humans, and how bird feeding can work.

When the "Beast from the East" rolled through Great Britain a few weeks ago, it brought both dismay and delight to those housebound people peering out at their gardens smothered in metres of snow.

Birds — sometimes of species almost never seen in towns — were everywhere. Twitter (no pun intended) was filled with images of desperate animals.

Feed the birds

For the millions of people who provide food for wild birds in their gardens, this became a time for action.

Social media was filled with pleas for people to venture through the drifts to refill their feeders: the birds need you NOW!

Bird and conservation groups in the UK broadcast the same message: feeding can mean the difference between life and death.

What struck me immediately about this desperate situation were the similarities to the UK's infamous Great Blizzard of 1890-91.

Despite the prevailing Victorian attitudes of "waste not, want not", the severity of the conditions and the plight of the suffering birds led to the first widespread examples of public bird feeding.

Spurred on by a multitude of items in the newspapers of the day, people were implored to search their kitchens for anything that the starving birds might eat.

Cat eating bird in WA Beware the obvious dangers of bringing birds into your garden.(Supplied: Jiri Lochman)

A letter to the London Daily News from "Johnnie Thrush" suggested a mix of stale bread, water, oatmeal or barley meal and a few handfuls of hempseed.

This appears to have been a pivotal moment.

Thereafter, feeding wild birds — a practice that would normally have been regarded as simply wasteful — became acceptable, widespread and even a sign of moral expression.

Today in the UK, the feeding of wild birds in private gardens is a gigantic industry and not just in cold weather conditions.

Millions of people provide enormous amounts of bird food, mostly seed, all of which is consumed.

It is almost certainly the most popular form of interaction between humans and wild animals, and is actively promoted by organisations including the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and the Humane Society in the United States.

The message is clear: if you care about birds, feed them!

Feeding Down Under

In Australia, the social landscape could hardly be more different.

The message — if you dare to ask — has long been emphatically, although still informally, "don't!"

No jurisdictions have actually enacted anti-feeding legislation, but many have come close.

Australian King Parrot feeding backyard Canberra. Nov 2016Around a third to over half of all households in this country regularly feed birds at their homes.(666 ABC Canberra: Clarissa Thorpe)

The abundance of (but thoroughly ignored) Do Not Feed The Birds signs now common in parks is part of this approach. But I would argue this is a very different matter to bird feeding in domestic gardens.

The unavoidable conclusion gained from a multitude of sources here in Australia is that any form of bird feeding is wrong, dangerous, foolish, and profoundly misguided.
Those in the Northern Hemisphere who are interested in feeding birds can obtain endless and detailed advice on every conceivable aspect of the practice, and can buy a bewildering array of foods and feeders.

The contrast to Australia is stark and intriguing. Although there are plenty of bird feed products available with the label "Wild", these are mainly mixes for cage birds.

In terms of advice on feeding wild birds, however, this is almost all negative.

For example, BirdLife Australia says a "constant supply of 'artificial' food can be unhealthy for birds" and recommends that people opt instead for creating a "bird habitat through planting and providing water".

Despite the ubiquity of the anti-feeding message that almost everyone in Australia is aware of, the participation rate here is virtually identical to that of countries where the practice is promoted and encouraged.

About a third to more than half of all households in this country regularly feed birds at their homes.

That's millions of people, most of whom care deeply about whether they are doing the right thing but who have nowhere to get advice or directions on best practice.

The only information available is a long list of the alarming things that can result from feeding birds, such as this advice against feeding lorikeets.

Colourful flower and birdProfessor Jones says a bird's feeder intake is "just a top up on what they might eat in a day".(ABC Open Contributor Chris J)

These were indeed disturbing and included (to take just the top few): dependency (the birds may become reliant on the food we provide); disease (feeders can spread disease); and nutrition (the food provided is often of poor quality).

If these concerns were valid, everyone needed to be aware of them and adjust — or stop — their seemingly trivial pastime accordingly.

Finding, distilling and understanding the research on which these issues were presumably based resulted in my new book.

It was a process that profoundly altered my perceptions and made me even more determined to encourage a meaningful discussion about bird feeding here and around the world.

It's a complex picture (as usual) but to address the key issues raised earlier: there is no evidence that birds become dependent on the food we provide (except in extreme conditions such as severe snow or drought).

Reassuringly, most birds visit feeders for a passing snack and the majority of their daily diet is still natural.

How to feed the birds

So, if we want to feed the birds in your garden then there are a few very simple rules you should follow to make sure you feed them the correct way.

A cockatoo and a kangaroo both feed from a bird feederRemember that the feeders are really for us, rather than the birds.(ABC Open Contributor Terry Lewin)

It's a snack, not a meal. You don't need to provide too much food. The birds only need a little; they will (and should) get most of their diet the natural way.

Keep it clean. Your bird feeder is a plate as well as a table, so clean it thoroughly every day.

Simple is best. Avoid anything processed (including mince or bread) or that contains salt or sugar. Seeds or commercial pet food is best.

Mix it up. Change the menu and even the timing. They don't need our food but it's nice when they visit.

Remember that the feeders are really for us, rather than the birds. They don't need them, but they don't seem to mind.

Darryl Jones is deputy director of Environmental Futures Research Institute at Griffith University. This article first appeared on The Conversation.

 

I am guilty, but I only put out once a day and only a small amount of "wild bird seed" trouble is I mainly get Spotted doves, sometimes the Lorikeets drop in. When you rent you cannot spend too much money on planting natives, though I still have planted a few.

My late parents had a 'date' with the local kookaburras each afternoon the birds would come and sit on the Hills Hoist and wait to be fed!  Dad cut up some roo steak!  Did they make a noise if they were kept waiting too. LOL

30 Hills hoist ideas | hoist, clothes line, hills Australian Icons | Australian icons, Australia, Adelaide south australia taken off the net!

 

 

Birds  Pet sounds: why birds have much in common with humans

An expert on Australian native species says birds can have empathy, grieve after the death of a partner and form long-term friendships

Kookaburras

Kookaburras’ tight-knit families can be compared to our own social groupings, says Prof Gisela Kaplan. Photograph: Russell McPhedran/AP Gisela KaplanTue 6 Dec 2016 06.20 AEDT

It is generally quite well-known that kookaburras live in family groups: a bonded male and female, plus a retainer of their offspring. Numbers matter in kookaburra society because a neighbouring tribe may have its eye firmly on the expansion of territory – and may invade a smaller group.

This means the injury and eventual death of one bird – most crucially of one of the parent birds – can have disastrous effects for the remaining group. They could be evicted from their home, which is likely to lead to their death.

 

I once told all this to a human family of five. The oldest of the three children, a 12-year-old boy, had found an injured kookaburra on the grounds of their own expansive rural property in country New South Wales, and he had taken the bird to his parents, who then rang me for help.

The bird had a fractured wing – and 21 days later, after it was completely healed and able to fly again, I asked them whether they would like to witness the release. They did.

 Penguin Bloom: how a scruffy magpie saved a familyRead more

Before the bird re-entered the wild, I told them how important it was to the kookaburra family that they had saved this female – it had potentially saved them all from eviction, and death. I explained that we had to pick our spot well: territories were not usually very large (some 2.5 sq km) and, if released in a hostile territory, the bird could have been killed as an intruder.

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I added that once the released kookaburra had landed on a branch, the other members should soon join it, and together they would sing a resounding chorus in triumph of their reunion. And so it was. I released the bird, and, sure enough, other kookaburras soon landed on the same branch and they all sang together.

Years later I learned that this specific release had made a deep and lasting impression on all the family, and had directly led the oldest boy into a career as a veterinarian. The mother explained that the day of the release was as if a whole new world had opened to him; he began to look with new eyes at the natural world and, more importantly, made a connection with it in such a way that he felt he wanted to know and do more.

He was captivated by the fact that the saving of one kookaburra could have been so crucially important – and that birds could have this in common with human families.

Gisela Kaplan and a magpieGisela Kaplan and a magpie, one of the most outstanding mimics in the world

In fact, birds – at least some of the species we have studied – have a surprising number of things in common with humans, some of which we have learned only over the last few decades. Both birds and humans can learn how to use their voice, and some birds and humans can even mimic other species – the best proof that vocalisation is a learned behaviour.

Australian magpies and lyrebirds are probably the most outstanding mimics in the world. Both species have pure tone, beautiful sounding song and extensive repertoires.

There are reports of people who, hearing the neighing of a horse where no horse should be, were driven by curiosity to check in the yard. Moving to the source of the sound, they saw a magpie sitting in a tree doing a mighty good imitation of a horse.

The lyrebird male mimics merely to dazzle a female with his artistry. Unlike the lyrebird, magpies have the additional ability to mimic human speech, as do many parrot species.

It has been thought that mimicry is mindless. True, some mimicry may be no more than a repeat of other sounds, without the bird understanding the meaning – but in some cases the mimicry is used in meaningful ways.

An example I have cited often is the brief but telling story of a magpie living on a rural property in inland NSW, which had learned to mimic the name of the resident pet dog. The property also had a pet cat that repeatedly tried to get rid of the magpie. When the cat approached, the magpie called the dog – then the dog came running and chased the cat away.

This anecdote is special in that it suggests that calling the dog was not mindless mimicry but it had become a useful linguistic tool to achieve a specific outcome. This interpretation fits well with our findings that magpies have the beginning of lexicon.

For instance, we discovered some years ago that magpies have specific and designated food calls and “eagle alarm” calls. One can play the alarm call back to them, placing the speakers on the ground, and, without fail, the response of magpies is to look up. If this call sequence did not have any specific meaning, one would expect them to have looked at the sound source instead.

 Scientists scale trees in desperate attempt to save orange-bellied parrotRead more

Related evidence also showed magpies even using gestures and pointing when vocal messages seem insufficient in identifying a risk. Incidentally, a true-blue Aussie budgerigar (actually green and yellow in the natural environment) is the Guinness World Records holder among birds in the number of words it can mimic – more than 1,700 English words!

We now know that birds can have multiple and remarkable cognitive abilities. They can also feel, have empathy and even grieve for the death of a partner; magpies in particular, apart from parrots, can form long-term friendships with humans or their dogs.

Once we learn about the inner life of magpies, and what we have in common with them, a whole new world can open up for us too, and may make us more likely to see them as part of our culture and heritage, and to protect them.

This is certainly one reason why I continue to write about native birds.

• Prof Gisela Kaplan will be presenting talks on Very Clever Magpies and the Private Lives of Local Birds on 6 and 7 December, as part Birds: Flight Paths in Australian Art which runs at the Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery until 12 February. Kaplan’s latest book, Bird Minds: Cognition and Behaviour of Australian Native Birds, is out now

 

Lovely article about the birds.

Oh yes the Nature Conservancy, what a great job they do, wonderful website.

The VERY unusual history of the bin chicken: Australia's most hated bird may have escaped from a popular zoo in the 1970s to breed in our capital cities

 

Ibises were rare in urban areas before the 1970s, which is when Sydney's Taronga Zoo began experimenting with free flight bird exhibits

 

I would disagree that it is the most hated bird, I think Seagulls are more of a pest. Ibis are protected Australian Native bird, so I think there is something not right about this story, this site has more information aoub the three different types of Ibis we have:

https://riversofcarbon.org.au/three-different-types-ibis-australia/

We have seen many times a white cockatoo hanging with an Ibis flock, but have not seen it for awhile now.

Hunt is on to find a heartless animal hater who dumped eight flea-infested puppies into a BIN and left them to die inside sealed food bags 

The RSPCA is hunting a heartless person in South Australia who tied eight helpless puppies into ziplock bags before dumping them in a remote truck stop bin to die. 

 

Another disgusting excuse for a human, poor little things. How traumatic for the six year old girl with her mother who found them.

And it happened in South Australia!

19 Magical Photos of Animals In Winter | Bored Panda

20 heart-warming pictures of animals in the snow | Metro News

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