Birdygirl,
four feet by twenty four? Well, one must have the courage of one's convictions: I think that's cruel. Full stop.
I guessed she was a fence-walker, but I'd thought I'd ask.
The Male? Female? Thing has interested me greatly. It was two years before I figured out that Felicity the Male Emu (He had such lovely eyelashes as a chick) was actually female. Linguists note that the representation of animal noises is a peculiarly language-specific thing. (Dogs go 'woof woof' in English, but 'gong gong' in Indonesian.) However, there's no mistaking the noises when you've heard them all: the females hunker down, and produce a 'fumph' or 'boom,' depending on what language you speak that can be heard for a mile on a still night, and easily distinguished from the males' grunt.
The fun, Birdygirl, is to patiently observe. As time passes, you realise, 'Ahh . . . so that's something something something!!' I've been watching the tame and wild birds at my farmhouse on a daily basis for three years, and I learn something new every week.
(My great joy is the occasion on which a thoroughly comfortable emu will kneel, then sit on its belly, then lay its neck on the ground, then keel over in the sunshine like a puppy baring its belly, and lie with one leg sticking up in the air. In three years, I've only seen this three times. THAT's a happy emu.)
Supreme Emu
