Murray Magpie

 The crested pigeon is quite a pretty bird,it makes this wonderful whirring noise as it flies off. The couples do this interesting little dance to each other, bowing and spreading their tails in a pretty fan while doing this. I can never tell who is male or female as they both look the same and they will alternate in their tail spreading dance.They have very attractive colours in their wing feathers and this cute little crest on their heads which they can raise or flatten. Their call is rather monotonous but not as penetrating as the Bronze wing pigeon. Their nest is an appallingly few sticks on a branch in the tree.

Yesterday I meant to insert the Murray Magpie sitting on the the little girl with dolphin, statue which sits on the edge of the pond as part of the garden scene. The statue attracts a lot of birds of various kinds as does the fish fountain bowl . We seem to have bred a few goldfish fry, I fished some up in the net when I was cleaning away a bit of algey. The bird above, the white faced heron, is also very interested in them, and he is hanging around quite a bit.At least he isn't as bad as the shag we had a few months ago and cleaned out quite a few fish as well as frogs. We seem to have a new frog at the moment , it is making quite a different sound and it is curious how his call stands out from the others. We also had 5ml or 20 points of rain yesterday which has been most welcome and saved watering today. Our fig tree is showing stress, so unusual, I have never had to water it before and has produced wonderful crops of figs I could hardly keep up with. put down jars and jars of sticky figs which lasts us all year. Brian has decided to make French Tarragon vinegar and is also hanging bunches of it up to dry. Must say Tarragon with chicken is delicious!!!