Buried treasure
While shifting some rocky soil to renovate a frog pond, we exposed what looked like a very large shiny worm. It was in fact a blind snake, Ramphotyphlops sp.
Blind snakes are non-venomous and rarely encountered as they spend most of their time burrowing in search of ants and termites. Not needing to see far, their eyes are greatly reduced and appear as dark spots covered with a transparent scale.
When trying to identify this particular snake we were surprised to find 42 species listed in our field guide for Australia, although only 4 have been reliably recorded in Victoria. From the descriptions and distribution maps, we think this is a Blackish (or Gray’s) Blind Snake (Ramphotyphlops nigrescens), probably a juvenile judging by its pinkish-brown colour, compared with the dark adult.
A positive identification would require counting the number of rows of mid-body scales and close examination of the head scales. However, not being experienced in handling snakes, and not wishing to stress the animal, we quickly returned it to the soil pile where it rapidly disappeared into a near-invisible crevice, to devour more termites we hope.
Arm the battlements—the walls have been breached
Mister
For more than a decade now we have smugly sat on the side of our hill watching the ferals invade the lowlands. Not the animals such as foxes, rabbits and cats. They seem to be everywhere and unstoppable. But the exotic birds. Down in the nearest township sparrows and the like mix it with the native birds. We have watched with dismay the advancing tide of Indian Mynas along our local roads from the direction of the big cities but somehow felt safe in the thought that the birds would stick to the open pasture lands. There has not been a sign of them in our woodland hilltop stronghold.
Then last week jumping out of the understorey next to the house was a feral of a totally unexpected type, a Blackbird. The walls have been breached; all is lost.
Ms
The Common Blackbird has the scientific name Turdus merula (somehow it seems appropriate!) – turdus being Latin for Thrush and merula Latin for blackbird. The Blackbird is a native of Europe and Asia. It was introduced to Melbourne in the late 1850s by a bird dealer. Since then the population has spread through much of south-eastern Australia.
The Blackbird is considered a pest because it competes with native birds for nesting sites and food sources and is also thought to spread weeds such as blackberry by dispersing the seed. On the upside traditionally they have been caught and used as food. A lot has been said about Indian Myna traps, not a word about Blackbird traps. Time for a Google search.
Who knows? Pies could be a common staple in our house in the near future.
Prophet of evil ?
Early spring sees the return of some of the seasonal migratory birds after their winter sojourn in warmer climes further north. Examples are the Black-faced Cuckoo-shrike, Olive-backed Oriole, Rufous Whistler and, being breeding time, the various cuckoos. So far we have had Shining Bronze-Cuckoo and, prominent in our garden, the Fan-tailed Cuckoo pictured here.
Its distinctive features are the yellow eye-ring, barred tail, cinnamon colouring on its underparts and the male’s call, a mournful trill (click on the audio below).
What is not especially noticeable, despite its species name, is a fan-tail. Fraser and Gray in their fascinating book Australian Bird Names – a complete guide, suggest that this is because John Latham who first described the species in 1802, had never seen a live one!
The genus name Cacomantis meaning “prophet of evil” is however appropriate, that is if you happen to be a thornbill, scrubwren, fairy wren or any of the many other species of small birds parasitised by the Fan-tailed Cuckoo. What we find extraordinary is that although these birds clearly see the cuckoo as a threat – they emit frenzied alarm calls when it is around and even harass it – they readily feed the cuckoo chick which, to our eyes at least, bears no resemblance to their own offspring. The power of a bright gape and loud pleading squawks perhaps!
In the picture at left you can see a (blurred) Eastern Spinebill which was dive bombing and clacking at the cuckoo. You can also see the cinnamon breast of the cuckoo – we think this is a female – in the male the cinnamon extends right down the front.
Fan-tailed cuckoo calls:
Where’s the party?
Carpentry is a lonely chore. I am currently renovating the external stairs at our place and as I don’t have a shed it’s happening under the cover of the deck. It is a cold and lonely job at this time of the year. Last weekend I was kept company by this critter which spent many hours simply walking around the stack of wood I was cutting.
Barely a centimetre long this beetle is a scarab beetle which belongs to a subfamily called Stag Beetles, so called because of the extended jaws resemble the antlers of a stag. The females are smaller in size with smaller jaws. The male stags use their jaws to fight other male stag beetles for food or mates. In this species (whatever it is) the 
jaws are quite small. Some species have mandibles approaching the same length of the body in size. The fan-like antennae are composed of plates that can sense odours.
I managed to work the whole afternoon without squashing, nailing or painting the beetle as it kept up its forlorn wanderings – just a stag looking for a party.
Looping along
This multi-coloured and intricately-patterned caterpillar is one of a group known as loopers, so called because of their method of locomotion.
Being somewhat challenged in the leg department, a looper brings its hind clasping legs up to its front legs, forming a loop in its body, as pictured at left, then moves forward using its front legs.
Looper caterpillars mostly belong in the moth family Geometridae, and the one pictured here is in the genus Chlenias. Unlike this colourful caterpillar, Chlenias spp moths are generally of delicate muted brown colouring.
Our specimen was found on a stem of Drooping Cassinia (Cassinia arcuata). Some loopers are voracious feeders and known to cause severe defoliation of the host plant.
Thanks to Ken Walker and BowerBird for putting us on the right track for identification, so that we were able to find more detailed information, including a possible species identification, in Moths of Victoria – Part 5, where there is a photo of a very similar-looking caterpillar, also found on a Drooping Cassinia, and named as Chlenias zonaea.
At home in a hay shed #2
Last month we had a story of a Nankeen Kestrel that has taken up residence in our hay shed. Now we learn that there’s a bale of hay in the shed at the Three Sisters property near Flowerdale that won’t be available for stockfeed for a while. A pair of Striated Pardalotes has taken advantage of the holes made by spikes on the tractor used to lift large round bales, and has adopted one of the holes as a tunnel to their nest chamber inside the bale. The two birds can be seen in the picture at left.
Striated Pardalotes usually build their nest in a tree hollow, or tunnel into a creek bank or roadside cutting, but are known to be opportunists and can nest in vent pipes, cracks in house walls or, in one case in our shed, a stack of polystyrene boxes.
Their “chip-chip” call can be heard around the district at present. Click on the audio bar below for a sample of their calls, which includes their soft contact trills, recorded locally.
Thanks to David Hubbard for the story and photos.
What birds tweet each other #2
Listening to the wild
It’s all in the sound! The way creatures use sound to communicate, and the evolution of animal sounds, are fascinating subjects. More sophisticated recording equipment and computer analysis using sonograms have
led to great advances in the study of natural sounds.
So the Strath Creek Landcare Group is delighted to be hosting a presentation by Andrew Skeoch in Broadford
on Friday 4th September titled Listening to the Wild!
Andrew is a sound recordist, bioacoustic researcher and above all a passionate nature lover and communicator.
He will open your eyes, and ears, to the amazing world of the sounds of nature. All are welcome, but please do reserve your place with Laurie at focusonfauna@gmail.com
For full details click on the flyer at left.
On the weekend following Andrew’s presentation, the Australian Wildlife Sound Recording Group is hosting an introductory workshop on Nature Sound Recording run by Andrew, together with Bob Tomkins, at the same venue in Broadford.
For further details download the flyer:
Wildlife Sound Recording workshop.
Spot the spider
ARACHNOPHOBES GO NO FURTHER!
It’s a dangerous world out there in nature, so camouflage is a very useful strategy to adopt to avoid predation. Last week we noticed, purely by chance, the spider pictured at left which was hunched up on a wooden fence dropper, some days on the top of the post and others on the side, but always well-camouflaged and hard to spot.
It looks to us like a native Garden Orb-weaving Spider (Eriophora sp.), identified by its roughly triangular abdomen with two humps near the front, its leaf-like pattern on its back and, on close inspection but not obvious in the photos, red on the base of its legs.
Garden orb-weaving spiders build an intricate sticky new web each night, ready to catch insects which they sense by vibrations and quickly wrap in silk. They dismantle their web at dawn and rest nearby during the day with legs drawn in, easily blending in with the surrounds like the one pictured here.
For more information go to the Australian Museum website.
At dusk it comes
It started in early winter. A pile of bird droppings on the ground outside our front door suggested that if we looked up we would see a nest, maybe of a Welcome Swallow, tucked under the eaves. But a search revealed no swallow’s nest, or nest of any kind, or even a hole in the fascia boards through which a bird might enter to create a nest. Day by day the pile of poo continued to grow.
During the day nothing inhabited the eaves above the door but after dusk we noticed a grey/brown bird (pictured left) clinging to the brickwork, asleep. Passing this photograph around the local birdos resulted in a range of guesses about what the bird was but I wasn’t about to disturb the 
roosting bird to find out. Time for the motion-sensing camera! Using a jury-rigged system of stepladder, occy straps and pipe insulation, the camera was set up to reveal our visitor to be a White-throated Treecreeper (Cormobates leucophaea), pictured right.
Perching birds such as treecreepers can sleep clinging to branches and vertical surfaces. Their legs and feet are controlled by special tendons so that when a bird bends its legs the feet automatically close. It’s analogous to having your toes curl every time you sit down. In this way birds can sit and be securely locked on to a branch or surface to sleep. A look at the size of a 
treecreeper’s feet (pictured left) shows that it can easily support itself to cling to our vertical wall.
On our property individual animals that we regularly come into contact with are given ‘human’ names. Focus on Fauna is scattered with accounts of the exploits of Wally the Southern Brown Tree Frog and Cato the Swamp Wallaby. In keeping with this tradition we are naming this bird as well. Given where it sleeps at night, and assuming it’s a female, we have dubbed it Evie.
Focus On Fauna 