I have been fascinated by satin bowerbirds for many years, particularly the way the collections of blue ornaments by the adult males reflects our social history. Long gone are the days when blue berries and bird feathers were the favoured items. Most of the treasure these days
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Widow Wonga is a bird very close to my heart….and is loved just as much by my husband Rob. She and her partner have been living and rearing chicks in our Blackheath garden over a very long period, sometimes producing several sets of twins a year. I
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Isn’t this just the most wonderfully constructed bower? Good, thick walls and a perfectly shaped, oval ‘front door’. You might say Mr. S. has home construction pegged (sorry, I couldn’t resist). He is a builder extraordinaire and a credit to the community of Blackheath. JULY 21 —
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For what seems a very long time I have been following two building projects here in the Blue Mountains’ village of Blackheath. I am beginning to wonder whether either of them will ever reach completion. The first of the intrepid owner builders is Mr Satin Bowerbird, of
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After a residency of some years, the satin bowerbird in Soldier’s Memorial Park at Blackheath departed his well known property. It was very sad for those of us who had been observing him. We watched with interest as the local ban on plastic straws changed his treasure
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Editor Des has been bird watching with me for the last few months, and becoming quite the ‘twitcher’. Unfortunately he has a lot to learn, which recently led to a head injury…. and a severe knock to his confidence. It should be remembered that a male satin
Read more →It’s almost the end of May, and the village of Blackheath in the Blue Mountains is looking its best. Tourists are enjoying the colourful foliage in Wentworth Street. Even the shaded little maple tree growing above the satin bowerbird’s lair is changing colour. What a fantastic location
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It has been a long courting season for the bowerbird in Blackheath’s Memorial Park. I began monitoring his ‘boudoir’ in mid August 2018. Without doubt it was one of the most beautiful, symmetrically arranged collections of blue treasures I had ever seen. WOOING IS A WEARYSOME BUSINESS
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Like most people, I have a garden full of plants given to me by friends and neighbours. They are all very special. Some years ago I went on an outing to the home of the late Laurel Phillips, a life-member of our local garden club at Blackheath,
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WARNING…..INCLUDES CONFRONTING SPIDER PICTURE! It wasn’t until my friend Dianne told me about her battle to get rid of ivy in her new garden that I realized my own ivy problem had become super-serious. Stupidly, I had deliberately spread the variegated variety around. I’d considered it more
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