Ben Cruachan – natural history

So, I and the Bird is having its second anniversary on July the 12th, well that’s a coincidence, because on that date when it starts its third year, I start my seventy third year. I spent the first ten years of my life in suburbia, and my big interest in those days was not birds, but insects. I used to collect Gum Emperor Moth and Cup Moth larvae from the Corymbia ficifolia trees a few streets away, and keep them until they pupated and emerged as adults. The memory is a funny thing though, and the odd bird sighting is still imprinted, perhaps pointing to what was to become something of a passion in later life.
The first of those sightings filed away in the old grey matter is the humble canary. My late Mother loved birds and kept a large aviary of canaries, and if I think back I can still see them in the aviary in the back yard.
The second is another exotic, the English Song Thrush, which used to fossick for snails under the passion fruit vine in the front garden. I grew that vine from seed from a fruit given to me by the lady across the road, and it was a beauty. At that time it was said that the seeds could give you appendicitis, but it didn’t stop me eating them despite my apprehension!
Number three is my first-remembered native bird, the Eastern Yellow Robin. When I was about four or five my Mother and Aunt rented a house on the Mornington Peninsular, the garden backed on to bush, and it was there that I first saw the bird that is something of a favourite of mine.

Then in 1939 came WW2, and a period of family upheaval that culminated in our move to my Uncle’s farm at Bellbird Corner. I was soon a country boy, trapping rabbits which in those days were in plague proportions, and fishing in the river and creek, but the odd bird still pinged my subconscious. The Bellbird farm had lots of billabongs, and we used to see these small birds working around the edges, we called them sandpipers then. They weren’t of course, they were Black-fronted Dotterels, or are they called Plovers now? It’s said that if rain falls and water accumulates, there’ll soon be a pair of these little birds in residence. It’s true too, on more than one occasion I’ve seen them take possession of roadside puddles a couple of metres across.

I remember two more birds from that time, the first is a breeding migrant that seems to have become more common in recent years. I clearly recall Mother saying “Look, an Olive-backed Oriole”, a bird I haven’t been able to successfully photograph yet, but I have snapped the other. In the big redgums along the river we used to see large stick nests, they belonged to what my Uncle called Whistling Eagles, and we often heard their whistling calls. The proper name is Whistling Kite, a common bird over the watercourses and wetlands, soaring head down, wings bowed, ever circling.

After the farm, life moved on in the town with different interests and priorities, but birds still seemed to make an impression. In the early seventies while recovering from a severe accident, a gift of a handbook on the eucalypts triggered an interest in native plants and botany, an interest that still looms large, but then I joined a local birdwatching club and finally became a committed birder.
There was one more development to come, computers and blogging. I first became aware of virtual birding from a series of articles Tom Tarrant wrote in the wonderful but now defunct magazine Birds International. After some time and soul searching I started a nature and birding blog to share my experiences with others, and then saw where this bloke named Mike Bergin was starting a bird blog carnival. I sent Mike a link and two years later this is my fifty third contribution, a lot of sharing, but that’s what it’s all about, so Mike, in response to your request for a reason to read, here’s mine, “Welcome to my world.”