Wa ha ha! Felicity has found another spot in the gums to sleep. I don’t think she likes Mr. Stickybeak to know where she kips. On the evening after I watched her settle down near the fig tree, she moseyed off into the gums right over the other side of the house-clearing. Then again, last night, she went the same way. So, this morning at dawn, I knew that the long string of medium-ish dawn booms was her.
The wild birds patiently vary their diet. They eat most of their ration of wheat right off the bat, then they graze for a while, then they forage under the lilly pilly tree – if they are powerful birds. If not, they go back to grazing. Here yet again is the power-structure thing. The weaker birds – the ones standing disconsolately in the gums – are, in effect, waiting for a chance to slip in to get better forage. Meanwhile, no grain of wheat is ultimately overlooked (if nothing else, the ring-necked parrots will get it). Later in the day, a bird will return to where the ration was thrown down, and peck up every single grain. It’s an unending ballet of power=food; and long hours of observation makes it quite apparent.
It would be most interesting to know the contents of a wild bird’s stomach for one day. A while ago, I was walking down the back with Greedy. I saw her pick up and then drop a piece of seed pod hardly bigger than a fingernail clipping. Then she picked it up again and swallowed it. We might wonder if the nutritional value of such a morsel even supplied the energy to pick it up and swallow it. (Would someone please tell me the weight of one of your bird’s daily ration. I am interested to know.)
The birds spend hours and hours every day Where Ever the Main Food Source Is. If I seem strangely fixated on that blasted fig tree, it’s because its fruit is a largesse that perhaps spells the difference between success and failure in the mating game – certainly for the males, as it’s the Last Big Feed before winter and The Big Fast of those lucky enough to breed.* The wild birds that have visited recently go straight in under the lilly pilly tree. In late spring, Mr. and Mrs. Eric spend long hours coming and going to and from the various plum trees. They aren’t stupid: the flying birds tend to drop fruit as they sample the ripe stuff, and I’ve seen Mr. and Mrs. make a bee line for the plum tree upon hearing a flock of ring-necked parrots alight in it. Indeed, they sometimes just stand motionless beneath the tree, waiting for the plums to fall.
Clearly the wild birds aren’t starving. I can’t distinguish them by weight from my birds. Nevertheless, two teacups of wheat per bird per day, and as much as several double handfuls of lilly pillies (knocked down with a pole), or a dozen or more plums – not to mention the excellent ‘pick’ of the house-clearing itself – is the mainspring of the dynamic whereby the house-clearing birds are the alpha-alpha birds: they can ‘hold’ the clearing, where the goodies are, and because they get those goodies, they are well-fed enough to . . . hold the house-clearing, and get those goodies.
Greedy is here (absent evenings; present days). She is not doing the pseudo-vomiting thing, but she’s clearly still a most unwell bird.
*As an experiment, I have tested the upper limits of an emu’s readiness to eat figs. Two teacups of wheat is as much as a bird can eat at a sitting; but – and bear in mind, boys and girls, that figs cost a buck fifty a pop at Le Trendoid Department Store – I have heaved figs down Greedy’s gullet until my arm got tired, and she never even slowed down.
Supreme Emu
