More on Australian birds.

I am going to tell you all today about our largest birds excluding sea birds excepting our Pelican, a delightful bird.

We have ten all called by all manner of names I shall do 5 today with their English names here first up we have the Magpie Goose a noisy creature and not found in the state of South Australia thanks to human settlement and drought they were also poisoned and shot I read in my library

They are also under threat from the water buffalo that we imported from Indonesia for the north of this land.

These birds honk so a little noisy and no exotic plumage like our parrots but they play an important role in our eco system; as do most water fowl.

Next there is the Southern Cassowary often called the Australian Cassowary or Doubled-wattled Cassowary.

I mentioned this bloke in an earlier blog post, I only mention him here as I am doing this post on our ten largest birds.

This feller is a loner most of the year and can often give you a bit of a fright if you are in the rainforest, hissing if you get too close to him.

Then there is the Cape Barren Goose or pig goose

They are unique to Australia and among the least numerous waterfowl in the world today.

A fully protected bird as at one time they were eaten rather a lot by us humans until the seal industry started up here.

An odd thing is they rarely enter the water.

A strange one this the Australian Bustard found now mainly in the north and New Guinea otherwise known as a wild Turkey not to be confused with our bush Turkey; rarely seen these days sadly.

The Brolga Queensland’s national bird is among these large fellers I blogged about this one before suffice to say it dances and can be confused with the Saurus Crane as they are very similar in appearance.

It stands a tad higher than a full grown steer.

The Saurus Crane was only discovered in Queensland in the 1960’s as it was further north, they can also be found in India, South East Asia and the Philippines as you can see there are similarities.

Now the Black necked stork AKA the Jabiru or policeman bird can be seen here quite regularly strutting around foraging a very common sight here like the Sacred Iris who is usually here in the cooler months.

comments most welcome