jmgoyder

wings and things

Dec 15

Wait a second – don’t delete me (yet!)

by jmgoyder

This is my 70th post and it has nothing to do with birds, not really. It has more to do with belly laughing at myself, which is what I’ve been doing for several minutes. Why?

Well, I was on the phone with a good friend (just before the belly laughing attack) and it was when she said, “Thank you for all the emails,” that I realised she thought that I was doing the email bombardment thing.

So I am using this opportunity to explain to those friends and family who were kind enough to subscribe to my blog, that it is NOT ME sending you these emails; the blog system that I belong to (WordPress) sends them to you every time I write a ‘post’ (for me this entails a mini-article with a picture or two). This means that if I am in a particularly wordy mood, you poor subscribers might get two, sometimes three, emails per day.

Again, IT’S NOT ME. Okay, I am doing the writing, but the emails just happen automatically unless you unsubscribe. Unfortunately, if you are unitiated in the world of blogging (and, remember, I am only newly initiated) you might not know how to unsubscribe in which case my blog posts will continued to crowd your email’s inbox.

I hope this explanation is not going to mean I lose half my audience!

Oh, and because this is a blog that is primarily about birds (okay, so it’s evolved into something a bit more maybe) the picture above is of our two Aracauna hens who are supposed to be laying blue eggs.

We haven’t seen a blue egg yet!

Uncategorized

17 Comments »
Dec 15

Emu farm

by jmgoyder

The emu breeder, Kip Venn, who delivered our new Emerys the other day, has given me permission to provide the following link to his website: http://www.emufarm.iinet.net.au/ Here is one of my favourite pictures from this website …

Kip gave me some very good advice and that was to spend as much time as possible with the new emus until they get used to the strangeness of human proximity, so I’ve been doing that and two of the emus will now allow me to pat them if I have a bit of food in my hand. I sit on an old tractor tyre and the biggest emu will run up to me, stare at me as if I am some sort of peculiar object, then take a bit of cabbage out of my hand, but if I say ‘hello’ – even if I say it really softly – he sprints off as if there has been an explosion!

Anyway, they are all settling in well, the only drawback being that during the evenings, nights and early mornings, they are ‘next door’ to the gang and Godfrey keeps poking his substantial beak, bill or whatever it is – I think of it as a ‘nose-in-the-air’ nose – through the fence that separates them and hissing.

Conversely, the Emerys are gentle, shy, unassuming and adorable! And it is comforting to know that when I turn my back, unlike Godfrey, they will not bite me on the bum!

Wings

4 Comments »
Dec 14

If you love something….

by jmgoyder

Richard Bach (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Bach), author of Johnathon Livingstone Seagull, once said, “If you love something, set it free; if it comes backs it’s yours, if it doesn’t, it never was”, a quote which is now widely used in various contexts, and a quote that I have always associated with birds and wings and gutsy metaphor.

Tomorrow I have to take Husband up to a hospital in Perth where his condition and medications can be reassessed by his Parkinson’s disease specialist. This will be his fourth visit to this hospital; nevertheless it is always traumatic for both of us because it usually means a stay of around 4-5 days and I have to come home again and leave him there. The geographical distance is only 200 kilometres but it may as well be 20,000 – well, that’s how it feels.

When I first met Husband, I was 18 and he was 41. I had come to look after his mother who had recently broken her hip. It was my first job. For me it was love at first sight; for him, I was just a strange kid. Oh how I loved him! But it wasn’t reciprocated, so I had to do that ‘letting go’ thing. Once I grew up a bit, he fell in love too but it took awhile (just a few years, like a decade – no big deal, ha!)

So, happy ending in many ways – mutual adoration, a beautiful son a year after we were married … and then Husband got kidney cancer. That was the first illness, but it has been followed by a succession, all of which Husband has overcome or, at least, been resilient against. But then Parkinson’s disease took over our lives.

I cannot let him go; I cannot set him free; I wish he would come back.

And he will. While he is in hospital, Son and I will get the Christmas tree up and decorated and wrap Husband’s present. You’ll never guess what it is – it’s a cuckoo clock!

Wings

18 Comments »
Dec 14

Has anyone seen my boots?

by jmgoyder

Wantok, our red-tailed black cockatoo, is literally eating the house. Okay, that’s a bit of an exaggeration but let’s put it this way: she has taken a bite out of every single biteable object in our veranda – every chair, every shoe, every everything!

These were once my favourite boots! They were quite worn out anyway but they were wearable. Oh, she acts all innocent if I approach her. In fact right now, I am watching her from my office at the other end of the veranda and she is chewing the less damaged boot but twice now I have tried to take a photo of her in the act and she steps aside as if to say, ‘it wasn’t me!’

During her first week with us she chewed through three of her wooden perches after which I left her cage door open and now she won’t go back in there; the veranda has become her domain and she sleeps on top of her cage rather than inside it. I suppose it must be rather wonderful having this kind of freedom as, before we acquired her, she had never been outside a cage.

When Husband, his mother and brother first moved here some half century ago, one of the first things they did was to enclose this back veranda with windows so it is a perfect place for Wantok because the windows make it feel like outside but she is safe. The drawback for us, though, is that she is making one hell of a mess, so we are now considering an aviary after all. It’ll have to be a huge one though, to match the size of this veranda, but that way she will be outside (which I’m sure she’d prefer) and we will get our veranda back. I’m not sure; ideally I want to let Wantok out so she can fly more freely, but I’m afraid she might fly away. I have ordered a mate for her but he won’t arrive until March next year.

Any advice appreciated.

Or boot donations!

Wings

6 Comments »
Dec 13

Eye kisses

by jmgoyder

Buttons (our weiro) and I just watched the following youtube of Snoopy and Woodstock, then we looked at each other, amazed. I could see her thinking – yes thinking – ‘wow, that’s just like us!’ Buttons definitely had an expression of incredulity in her eyes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTssF_NYusQ

Speaking of eyes, after watching the clip, she did this eye kiss thing with me; she puts her face up against mine, then stretches up until her eyes and mine are almost touching, then she sort of brushes my eyelashes with her little beak very gently. The first time she did this was a bit nerve-wracking because, even though it’s just a little beak, it’s still a beak!

Every morning, Buttons lets out a kind of wolf whistle sound until I open her cage and let her out. Then she does exactly what Woodstock does in the youtube; she flies to me, sometimes miscalculating the distance between her cage, at one end of the veranda, and my office, which is at the other end, and crash lands here and there en route. She’s getting really good at it now though – often she makes it all the way to my shoulder.

Like Snoopy, I sometimes tire of her attention – and the constant eye kisses – and put her back on top of her cage but she keeps coming back! Here she is sitting just outside my office, waiting for me to call her!

Wings

14 Comments »
Dec 12

Darwinian devastation

by jmgoyder

Yes – survival of the fittest, the pecking order, natural selection – all of that.

In the bird/animal kingdom this is quite straightforward and even makes its own sense, but in the human kingdom it’s not quite so easy.

Husband, Son and I had an interesting conversation the other night about whether our birds and other animals had feelings, memories, consciences and, despite a vigorous to-and-fro debate, we didn’t come to any conclusions.

This frustrated Son who likes to have answers; it amused Husband who thinks Son and I are a bit odd; but, for me, this inconclusiveness is a gift of mystery and, once I got used to it (years ago), I became enthralled with all of those unanswerable questions about suffering, about unfairness, about why and why and why….

Neverthless I keep wanting to intervene in that life and death cycle; I keep wanting to insinuate myself into that in-betweenness, to save us in the same way I might have saved our first Zaruma.

Strange post I guess – sorry; I am between a 17 year old who wants to embrace life and a 75 year old who is faltering. To be inside this situation is a bit unbearable, but luckily I can do that ‘stand back’ thing, so I know it is all going to be all right.

Animal

10 Comments »
Dec 12

‘You’ve got to pick a pocket or two….’

by jmgoyder

The quote, in case you don’t remember or realise, is from Oliver – oh how I loved that movie!

Ever since we started accumulating a few (just a few!) birds I have gotten into the habit of always having bits of bread and lettuce in my back pockets and it didn’t take long for the gang to realise this. As a result, even after I have given them their morning treats, they pick and peck at my pockets relentlessy, so much so that most of my clothes are now full of holes.

This picture of Ola (Pilgrim goose on the left) and Zaruma (Muscovy duck) is the best I can do to show you what I’m talking about (as it’s difficult to take a picture of your own back pockets!) Ola is pecking at my trousers and Zaruma is heading towards my back pockets where Ola soon joins him.

Wings

4 Comments »
Dec 12

The Bubbles grow up

by jmgoyder

Remember how we lost our first turkey, Bubble, then replaced her with four more Bubbles?  Well, here is one of them (the cheekiest by far). He is big but he will get much bigger. I know because I saw his parents and they were gigantic and the dad was magnificent.

He is the only one who hops right up on the picnic table where I give the gang their morning treats (bread and lettuce). In fact, once I let them out of the yard, he flies straight to the table and waits patiently. He lets me pat him and tickle him under his chin (it’s interesting to get such a close-up look at where the expression ‘turkey neck’ comes from!)

But we still miss our original Bubble….

Wings

2 Comments »
Dec 11

Willy wagtails barricade wash-house

by jmgoyder

There are two things I need to define here; firstly, what is a willy wagtail? The link below will provide you with some information:

http://birdsinbackyards.net/species/Rhipidura-leucophrys

The second thing to define is wash-house. Don’t worry, I didn’t know what a wash-house was either once upon a time. The best way to define this phenomenon is to simply describe our wash-house. Okay, from a distance, it looks a bit like a cute little chalet adjacent to the main house. In reality, however, this is a small octogenarian shed which houses a washing machine, a couple of sinks, an old copper and a multiplicity of junk, some of which Husband assures me could be valuable and probably is. The only trouble is that I wouldn’t have a clue what these objects of antique art actually are; the only thing I recognise is a screwdriver which doesn’t actually cooperate the way screwdrivers should when you really need them so it, like other tooly objects, sits in one of the many piles, waiting in vain hope to be rescued by Sothebys.

I have become so used to doing the washing in these somewhat primitive conditions that it doesn’t bother me in the least, except in Spring when the willy wagtails build their nests. They build these nests everywhere of course but the most elaborate of these is the one in the wash-house. Every year there is a nest, eggs, babies and so on and, despite the fact that I love all of that, those willy wagtail parents give me hell when I am trying to do the washing.

You see, they screech, then dive bomb me and, even though they are so tiny, they are very good at head-butting and (I know this is going to sound ridiculous), I am terrified of them!

Hence, I am very much behind with the washing. I mean this is one hell of a scary looking bird, wouldn’t you agree?

Wings

11 Comments »
Dec 11

The cute little emus

by jmgoyder

Well, I know you guys were probably expecting to see cute little emus and they are definitely cute, but not so little! They were unloaded into their yard and wandered calmly and curiously around the newly trimmed wattle trees, pecking at the cabbage (they love cabbage) I had sprinkled here and there. They did look rather longingly out to the back paddock and, because they have been raised on a farm, they are not as tameable as the other Emerys were, so it is going to be a bit of a challenge but I did manage to pat a couple of them later in the afternoon so I don’t think it will take long for them to trust me. I hope so because I really want to let them free range as soon as possible because the yard, though big enough and fox proofed, is not exactly the Ritz (you can blame the pigs for that!) and the lack of grass is a problem.

This morning when I went out, I was surprised to see how much water they had drunk until I remembered falling into their pool last night! I didn’t tell Son about this but since I woke up with a black eye I had to admit what happened and, yes, he and Husband are sharing yet another laugh at my expense – not funny!

Today we have the job of clearing out the wattle branches, raking the yard and distributing lawn clippings. Son is extremely excited about these chores (do you detect a note of sarcasm?) He is angry with me, not for getting the emus but for keeping it a secret. “We’re supposed to tell each other everything,” he said. “Oh,” I said, “I didn’t know that was a rule.” I’m actually a little nervous of him telling me everything; after all he is a 17-year-old male! We’ll see if his rule has longevity, although I have to admit Son always has told us everything and, when he was much younger and first started to sprout hairs in otherwise hairless places, he would give us a daily count (think armpits please!)  Thankfully, that only lasted a few weeks!

Anyway, back to the emus. Here are a couple of pictures:

Wings

8 Comments »
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