Planet Rothschildi

[Tame Emu Guy]

Wa ha ha – I’ve thought about this too. Perhaps she says to wild emus, ‘Well, it took me a thousand days to tame this guy; but now we can make fine observations of him.’

S.E.

 

[yinepu]

Wa ha ha – I’ve thought about this too. Perhaps she says to wild emus, ‘Well, it took me a thousand days to tame this guy; but now we can make fine observations of him.’

S.E.

as smart as the emu are.. it wouldn't surprise me in the least.. especially since she has you trained to come when she calls!

 

[Tame Emu Guy]

Greedy is the one, Yinepu. Felicity comes up to the house and goes, ‘boom?’

Greedy comes up to the house and goes, ‘BOOM!!!!!’

S.E.

 

[kbgh]

And they are all telling you it's time for wheat and sultanas.

K

 

[yinepu]

Greedy is the one, Yinepu. Felicity comes up to the house and goes, ‘boom?’

Greedy comes up to the house and goes, ‘BOOM!!!!!’

S.E.

ah.. so you have at least 2 "owners"

 

[Tame Emu Guy]

Hey, Yinepu!

we have a bunch of owners. It’s been one of the most enjoyable aspects of all the watching.


They thrash it out.

There’s been a ‘core’ of birds: Eric, Greedy, Felicity, Number One (we lost N.O.) – they’re the tame ones.

But ‘Foreign Bird’ was here for just one hour one time ever, gave Eric a flogging, and walked off.

What is a mite different this time is that there’s ‘accommodation’ going on here. Neither of these pairs is just gonna outright hook into the other.

That still actually shows that Felicity is only just hangin’ in. Getting a consort is not the only thing. She really wants to pin down some territory. At the end of last winter, she was in charge of the clearing. Full stop. She can’t do that now. Changed circumstances.

S.E.

 

[Tame Emu Guy]

I still think that Felicity and Noddy are ‘operating’ partly from beyond my place, that is, crossing the highway from the National Park. Several times I have seen her, with Noddy in tow, walking down the track from the highway. Got no idea what it all means.

She’s here now, and she’s injured. Not seriously: a good graze on the front of her hock – going through a fence? Fighting? Her chest has that ‘beaten look’ about it, as though she’s lost feathers.

It’s so frustrating to have so little information. When I patted her, she had bits and pieces in her chest feathers – from the talons of another bird? S.E. was able to ‘rub her chest feathers up the wrong way.' Doesn’t seem to be any wound.


She and Noddy will almost certainly roost here tonight.

M.F. and A. also here today. S.E. spent some pleasant minutes listening from close range as they foraged under the lilly pilly tree. They can't see you. You can listen to them.

On Monday morning, S.E. walked to the river before dawn. No vocalisations heard. On the way home from town, saw several groups of birds by the road. All seemed dark in colour.

[Oddly, you could get fair observations of them from the car because they don’t bolt from cars. If you open the car door – or you are on foot in the first place – they bolt.]


S.E.

 

[kbgh]

Quote: I still think Audacious is gonna be a daddy this year.

 

[Tame Emu Guy]

Hey, K.B.,

I don’t think you’re wrong – though I will have to find a little time to try to find his nest. They seem to have more so staked out the north side of the clearing, while F. and N. seem to be more so attuned to the south side.

I can only plead favouritism. Felicity has spent years standing in the gums, without a consort. She'll be five this winter. So, go, Felicity Emu!!

S.E. went for an old-man-no-binoculars walk today. The Wheel of Emu Life is turning once again: there are now swathes of rich new grass, and small pools of water standing in low spots. Nice grass coming on at the Top Corner, but no birds sighted.

My binos are on loan to the kids next door for a week, so the sightings were pretty rugged; but I saw a yearling on its own, one other bird, a splendid dark breeding-pair down by the corridor, and another pair grazing here in the clearing.

Magnificent weather: blowing hard, with towering grey storms rolling in from the south-west: sunshine, clouds, rain; sunshine, clouds, rain; sunshine, clouds, rain.

I never cease to be amazed by the water-proofness of the birds. It takes about three days of solid rain to really make them look bedraggled.

Managed to overhear the morning conversation of a breeding-pair at dawn a couple of days ago. Went out, in gum boots, with coffee, and slunk down to Meadow One. We wanted to audit a little. So, we sat down when we heard a pair talking, and stayed quiet. When we got up to go, to our surprise, the pair was less than fifty yards away, standing ‘behind’ the wall of the dam down there.

They had only been up for ten minutes – it was still first light. They had roosted about fifty yards in from Meadow One – you could roughly tell where they were from the calls.

I think they were saying that everything was okay, and deciding which pasture to graze on – they had Meadow Two just to their right, Meadow One just in front, and the clearing just a hundred yards further away. I don’t think they were ‘sounding out’ other emus. The calls were quiet and gentle.

They exchanged a dozen or so calls altogether, taking turns -- male and female easily distinguishable -- and then simply stopped talking: they were out grazing on the pasture. That’s the reason that I didn’t know they were there: they didn’t vocalise for five minutes or more.

S.E.

 

[kbgh]

Maybe you'll find 2 nests. Audacious and Noddy. Then you'll have a lot of chicks to "tame"

Interesting observation about the pair behind the dam, animals that large and still hidden in plain sight.

From other observations, I don't remember you saying how dark the emu are as much as you have recently. Could it be some other local birds have migrated in?

When looking at the you tube videos of the birds bathing, they never look soaked. One or two shakes and the feathers are back in place. Almost like water fowl.

K.