Planet Rothschildi

[Ashburnham]

Serious?!!

What? The emu crawls in underneath, then sends an sms so The Guys in The Guvvy Car can come get him?

S.E.

Ha ha - The Parks people were doing some sort of kangaroo research in the area- I think the cage is actually to protect electronic equipment or cameras used to
study the kangaroos from Emu damage!

 

[Tame Emu Guy]

For reference – sort of in answer to Yinepu’s joke about who really runs the place – The Protocol is:

there are three ‘tame’ birds, guys: Felicity, Greedy, and Eric. (Eric is not that tame; but I figure he has the rights of a tame bird.)

Each tame bird gets a double handful of wheat morning and evening. Greedy and Felicity get a handful of sultanas as a treat.
If a bird arrives after a long absence, it gets double rations for a couple of days.

Sometimes, S.E. has to throw wheat around so that a non-alpha bird gets something to eat – bullies get more! If a bird has a consort or chicks, the ration is the same.

The chicks aren’t being tamed. They share Eric’s ration.

Sometimes, some extra wheat gets thrown around: to keep birds here if visitors are coming, or to lure wild birds close enough to photograph.

And that’s it. Greedy and Felicity will allow you to stroke their necks as they eat, but won’t stand still for gratuitous pats. Eric is not the patting type.

The only other protocol is the one I’ve mentioned: around the birds, I speak softly; move slowly; and never ‘box them in’ in any way, like putting them between me and a fence.

S.E. unashamedly favours Felicity, but it doesn’t extend to more than a teacup of wheat. The best protection I can give here is to make sure that she gets here fair ration. Bullies rule here.

I mention all this only as part of understanding how we get our observations. Yes, the birds get fed. Yes, they get good tucker at the house-clearing. No, beyond that, their behaviour is pretty close to that of normal ‘wild’ birds. S.E. thinks that by far the greatest concern is overcrowding, which he suspects really does influence behaviour.

For Planet Rothschildi as a project:

‘observer’s affect’ is real, but well within bounds for the tame birds and their consorts and clutches.
Conversely, the wild birds – those that never get drawn into the house-clearing mob – move around and about here in absolute freedom. So, there’s an ‘entwined duality,’ and so long as we pay attention to what is what, and ‘adjust’ for it, we are getting high-quality data.

Now you know why S.E. so highly prizes ‘observing unseen.’ It’s one model in which the observer’s affect is close to nil.

Again today, readers, the birds went backwards nutritionally. E.P. were away for hours. Felicity and Felix were mostly here. We didn’t see them graze. K.B.’s thoughts were sound: F. and F. may well be making a play for control of the house-clearing. S.E. again saw Felix dissing Eric, that is, not moving until Eric was very close.

We checked Felicity’s blessing – she was kind enough to leave one in the carport. Gee! a bit of straw, black stuff, and – S.E. rubbed a bit between his fingers – an amount of soil that suggests that she is literally ‘grazing close to the ground.’ Not a single fruit stone or similar.

S.E.

 

[chickenzoo]

Eric may be getting older....but perhaps his lessened interest in full out confortation is because of his instinct to be around to take care of the chicks. If he went into all out battle mode and got seriously injured or killed.....his.chicks may perish thus ending his lineage and all this work he's done would be for not.....

 

[yinepu]

I think Felicity and Felix want the house clearing because it's close to a guaranteed source of food.. they aren't dumb.. if they are planning a clutch of eggs they want the area closest to food for their kids.
They also don't see you as a threat.. so what could be better?.. here they have a food source plus they get to have you around for company.. lol

I have to wonder how much they enjoy watching their "tame guy"

 

[Tame Emu Guy]

Morning, E.H.! A reply to you first:

Yeh!! I think your analysis is 100% right. I’ve been re-playing in my mind the stoush between Foreign Bird and Eric. I now think that the submission gesture was a submission, but also said, ‘Okay, I lost this one, and at this second, I’m not goin’ head to head with you. Take the apricots. Whatever – but if you come after me (and thereby threaten the chicks), don’t be fooled, I’ll take it down to the wire!!’

S.E.

 

[Tame Emu Guy]

Morning, Yinepu!! Gee, it’s nice to have people reading and contributing!

‘Yes’ and ‘Something Else as Well,’ I reckon.

Yes, the house-clearing is the finest ‘pasture’ for quite literally miles around, and the birds all know it.

(Supreme Emu delights to have newer citizens and older citizens. With the newer citizens, it’s the fun of having you turn up and say, ‘What!? You guys are observing emus in the Australian bush on a daily basis! Wow!’ With the older citizens, it’s having shared knowledge of the seasonal cycles.

[Find the oldest page of this thread. Emu Hugger is on the fourth post!!]

Wait, Yinepu, until you are here on a day when twelve or fourteen or sixteen or more wild birds all turn up at the same time to tax the figs, when three or four males bring clutches of four, five, six chicks through the house-clearing in the space of a couple of hours.)

Now here is the Something Else – and we are gonna study this until we have enough data to make good guesses – is the issue of home turf central?? Felicity Emu grew up under the fig tree.

Think about Boy Emu. There was food and water here, but he left with his clutch the very second they could travel, Yinepu!

Think about Felicity’s past. She could do very well on any other pasture, thank you very much! She is an alpha bird – but we have seen her standing disconsolately in the gums in the pouring rain, during winter, week in, week out. Why? Could it be attraction to her home turf?

We have an anecdote from a local (whom I respect) to the effect that male emus bring their clutches back to their home turf -- is that why Eric isn't here in winter? and turns up when the chicks are a few months old? and the fruit trees make the change of venues worthwhile?

No article on the Net has yet mentioned this.

Let’s keep watching.

And yeh, tee hee, S.E. has long wondered how the birds perceive him.
S.E.

 

[Tame Emu Guy]

Day Three:

maybe Omega Chick had a surge of bloodlust. Maybe she mistook Felix for dad. Maybe he just had an attack of the stupids: Omega wandered away from Eric and Alpha, and in behind the fig tree, where Felix and Felicity were. There was a shrill scream, and Omega came running out, and Eric went running in, and there was crashing and grunting.

It was a draw, I’d say; but, unless I’m quite mistaken, when Felix came out, he had one of Eric’s feathers hanging from his beak! S.E. reckons that a ‘draw’ is a significant victory for Felix.

Good morning, all! Day Three is begun. F. and F. arrived a minute before E.P. F. and F. are clearly operating down the back, where M.F. and A. were.

Let’s spare them a thought: the house-clearing is not a terminus, readers. It is a station on the eternal loop-line of emu life. So, when birds are not here, they are . . . somewhere else.

We have little doubt that Mystery Female and Audacious couldn’t stand the heat, so they got out of the kitchen. Speckles and Sarah have not made an appearance for some time. Neither have we seen a single other wild bird here for days and days.

The ‘swing and focus’ thing with the binos? S.E. is no great shakes at it; but yesterday, I managed to do it on a black-tailed cockatoo passing overhead, and was able to see its beak opening and closing as it vocalised. Cool!!

Brief notes now: inspection this morning; then S.E. is a free agent again.

S.E.

 

[kbgh]

Quote: Sorry Yinepu, I took a literary license and edited your post abit (see quote). This I feel hits the nail on the head. Food, safety for a future clutch and S.E. I'm not sure if they really love their "tame" S.E. or his food.


Quote: From all you've posted S.E. I'm quite sure this statement is true. If someone threatened the chicks, Eric probably would beat the crap out of them.

S.E. since you raised Felictiy, I'd be willing to bet she has imprinted on the house clearing as "home" but more importantly, you as her protector. I have seen ducklings hatched by an old hen that no matter what, they think of her as mother and protector and even as adults would rather hang out with the chickens rather than other ducks.

Many animals, including human ones, imprint on what is "home" and even though they may roam afar almost always rotate back to the original "home" even if only for brief periods.

K.B.

 

[Tame Emu Guy]

Yay! Inspection over! (S.E. will rest forthwith.)

Hey, K.B.!

We are in agreement about imprinting in general; but there’s a distinction that I should note:
yup, Felicity sees the clearing here as home turf; but she and her two siblings weren’t brought here by Eric until they were about the age that the chicks are now. She and I are in perfect accord, and this is her home turf . . . but I didn’t hand feed her until she was about nine or ten months old (autumn figs the year after she hatched). In short, I think it’s more about the territory than S.E.

The emus more so love the food.

Once before, I took a position that some might scoff at, ‘minimalism: if you think It all over, and then say, ‘Emus love grass,’ well, you might sound like a dimbulb. However, if, twenty years later, everyone else’s high-falutin’ theories are in rags, you look pretty clever to have simply said, ‘Emu love grass.’ (Historical fact, citizens: at least 60% of everything that has ever been taught in universities turned out to be utter nonsense.)

So, at this second:

One: Boy Emu came here with Greedy; hatched; and left. Conclusion: there’s a reason he didn’t stay. Possibility: he went home!

Two: This is great territory in the mating-season, but Eric has never been here during mating-season. Conclusion: perhaps he goes home to nest.

Three: Greedy was raised here (but not hatched here . . . ). She keeps turning up here for mating-season. Conclusion: ??

Four: Felicity seems prepared to be a pariah here in winter rather than go elsewhere. Conclusion?

And I say again – I delight to say this – if some ornee-O-thorlergist comes and tells us we’re a bunch of amatchoors, we’ll thumb our nose at her. We are involved in fine unaffiliated scholarship here. Full stop. S.E. hasn’t found an article on the Net yet that approaches the complexity that we deal with!

Eric and Foreign Bird:

Yes, K.B., there’s a subtlety:

there’s a difference between Eric defending the house-clearing, and Eric defending the chicks. As usual, it was E.H. who put her finger on it. When I saw Eric grovelling, I mistankenly saw it as ‘simple capitulation.’
I now think that it was a ‘territorial capitulation’ – ‘Take the apricots.’

But if Foreign Bird had threatened the chicks, does S.E. think Eric would have just sat there??!! Nuh. He have fought to the death. ‘Offspring capitulation’?? Never happen!

(It happens in our species. Male humans do it all the time: if things gets too hard, they move on; start another family; leave some female to raise it. Has anyone noticed that we don’t have the term ‘deadbeat mom’?)

S.E.

 

[Tame Emu Guy]

Day Three is going according to pattern. If Eric actually charges F. and F., they hastily withdraw. Otherwise, nibble, nibble, nibble, nibble . . .

Slow-motion palace coup!!

No other birds sighted.

S.E.

P.s.: we’d have different data if one of the two surviving tame birds was male.