About Me

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Canberra-based naturalist, conservationist, educator since 1980. I’m passionate about the natural world (especially the southern hemisphere), and trying to understand it and to share such understandings. To that aim I’ve written several books (most recently 'Birds in Their Habitats' and 'Australian Bird Names; origins and meanings'), and run tours all over Australia, and for 17 years to South and Central America. I've done a lot of ABC radio work, chaired a government environmental advisory committee and taught many adult education classes – and of course presented this blog, since 2012. I am a recipient of the Australian Natural History Medallion, the Australian Plants Award and most recently a Medal of the Order of Australia for ‘services to conservation and the environment’. I live happily in suburban Duffy with my partner Louise surrounded by a dense native garden and lots of birds.

Wednesday, 24 April 2013

The Song of the Butcherbird

The song of the Pied Butcherbird Cracticus nigrogularis is without doubt my favourite bird song of all. If you click here you can enjoy it while you read the rest of this brief post. (Andrew Skeoch is unquestionably one of Australia's foremost wildlife recorders and you could do worse than go on to his site after you finish here; and no, I've only met him once, by chance, and he doesn't know me!)



A bold hunter, the Pied Butcherbird is a bird of the dry inland, one of the reasons for my passion for it. And for the next month, I'll be hearing it, and you won't be reading me, as we head up through central Queensland, across the Donohue and Plenty 'Highways' (no bitumen, lots of dust and corrugations) to Alice Springs in the central deserts, and ultimately home via the Andamooka Track and the Flinders Ranges, definitely heart country for me.

I'll doubtless come back with lots of material for future postings, so please don't forget me! I'll be checking in when internet access allows (ie not very often) and would be glad of your comments.

BACK ON TUESDAY 28 MAY

2 comments:

Flabmeister said...

Enjoy your trip, and please bring a Pied Butcherbird back to Canberra so I can add it to my ACT list. (My lifelist ethics are, as you will have observed, a little flexible!)

Martin

Ian Fraser said...

It would appear on both our lists, thus guaranteeing my silence...