When you think of Aussie Kookaburra's, well the Laughing K is the one as it is a bit of an Aussie icon, but they have little known cousins in PNG and northern Australia as well. The northern Australian edition is called the Blue-winged K. On the perch it is disproportionally big-headed and slim bodied and it's call is a cacophony of annoyance and bad manners. In-flight it's a missile! I captured one in-flight a few years ago in a remote part of the Pilbara that I thought I might share on my website.
www.ararelitus.com
Actually, they are fairly unknown for most Australians who are mostly familiar with the Kookaburra of the loud chuckling variety. On the bush property where we lived in Eastern Victoria many years ago, our local family of Kookaburra's would arrive at the bird table after our evening meal for their share of the leftovers. They have a large territory and when I approached the table with the goodies they would swoop in from all points of the compass into the Grey Box tree in the back yard waiting for me to leave when they would collect up the bits of meat that we would cut into long strips. They would take them up into the tree and bash them against the branches of the box tree before swallowing them.
Birds — Arare Litus
Actually, they are fairly unknown for most Australians who are mostly familiar with the Kookaburra of the loud chuckling variety. On the bush property where we lived in Eastern Victoria many years ago, our local family of Kookaburra's would arrive at the bird table after our evening meal for their share of the leftovers. They have a large territory and when I approached the table with the goodies they would swoop in from all points of the compass into the Grey Box tree in the back yard waiting for me to leave when they would collect up the bits of meat that we would cut into long strips. They would take them up into the tree and bash them against the branches of the box tree before swallowing them.