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Sydney, Australia - Bird Sighting (What is this) (1 Viewer)

kamerukium

New member
I spotted this bird this afternoon and I have no idea what it is I have never seen it in the area before as well nor anywhere else? Any ideas as to what it is? It was alone.
 

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Welcome kamerukium

Thats a Channel-Billed Cuckoo - looks like an immature - born this season due to all the rain......
If it sticks around you can look forward to one hell of a racket - personally I quite like the sound - even at 6am! |:p|

Chosun|8)|
 
They're all over the place round Sydney at the moment - had a few calling already this morning.

I was in the bush for a while. Exmouth to be exact. There was a large black bird, kind of like our local Grackles but bigger. They made a call like they were laughing at us for being in the heat.

Awwww, Awwww, Awwww, Awwww. trialing off towards the end. Never did find out what they were...any ideas? I know they were very common....
 
Not sure what a " Grackle " is ?, but the bird you described sounds like an Australian Raven, very common in most parts of Australia,especially on road verges,they are mainly scavengers,specializing in road kill.
 
Not sure what a " Grackle " is ?, but the bird you described sounds like an Australian Raven, very common in most parts of Australia,especially on road verges,they are mainly scavengers,specializing in road kill.

Sounds about right. Four of us on a birding trip decided all the crows and ravens here should be lumped in six subspecies of White-eyed Crow, Corvus indistinctus.
 
Not sure what a " Grackle " is ?, but the bird you described sounds like an Australian Raven, very common in most parts of Australia,especially on road verges,they are mainly scavengers,specializing in road kill.

They're scavengers also. Live on a diet of cigarette butts and McDonalds french fries. Very colorfull mating dances where they spread there wings and tail and walk around the females cackling. Very smart bird also.
 

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Dryseals, yeah, Australian Raven as canonrock indicated. I can't help but laugh when I hear them, especially the ones that sound like a very adenoidal yet somehow very blase child being strangled. Hope you also got to hear Aussie Magpies in their dawn chorus, a truly heavenly sound. Someone described them as the sound of angels gargling.

LOL on the grackle description. Colonelboris, that's a Great-tailed Grackle shown in the pic, but the description is also apt for Florida's Boat-tailed Grackle, a close relative. The most widespread species, the Common Grackle, doesn't seem to hang out in fast-food carparks as much. All are members of the New World Icterid family.
 
Dryseals, yeah, Australian Raven as canonrock indicated. I can't help but laugh when I hear them, especially the ones that sound like a very adenoidal yet somehow very blase child being strangled. Hope you also got to hear Aussie Magpies in their dawn chorus, a truly heavenly sound. Someone described them as the sound of angels gargling.

LOL on the grackle description. Colonelboris, that's a Great-tailed Grackle shown in the pic, but the description is also apt for Florida's Boat-tailed Grackle, a close relative. The most widespread species, the Common Grackle, doesn't seem to hang out in fast-food carparks as much. All are members of the New World Icterid family.

It wasn't me! I agree with the Magpie description, though!
 
This is interesting as Exmouth is a fair way north of usual range for Australian Raven. Torresian Crow and Little Crow would be the usual corvids that far north. There are recordings of Torresian Crow (and Australian Raven) here - http://www.xeno-canto.org/australasia/browse.php?query=also:or:6863.00
Unfortunately, none for Little Crow.
I was in Exmouth a couple of years back and saw lots of Little Crows. When I reached Perth I saw lots of Aussie Ravens. The contrast was clear.
 
I think that I will need to stand corrected here.According to some research I have done,the Australian Raven is not recorded any further north than Kalbarri in W.A,as John says well south of Exmouth. As all six corvid species look very similar,the only way to nail it down is to listen to the calls of all species ( available on several websites ).
 
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