A hungry Pied Currawong

Pied Currawong

Over the last few posts here I have written about some of the birds I saw and photographed while in Sydney earlier this year. My wife and I were visiting our son and his family. During our four-week stay, we took every opportunity to get out and about visiting some of the nearby parks.

On one family picnic at Lane Cove National Park, our five-year-old grand-daughter was exploring a walking track with Nanna. They were looking for flowers on the native plants. Suddenly, a Pied Currawong landed in the tree only a few metres from the path. It began eating something it was clutching in its claws.

Next thing, I see my grand-daughter running back up the path towards me. She explained that they had seen a currawong and that I should come quickly to have a look. I walked as quickly as my old legs could carry me, camera at the ready. The currawong was quite unconcerned about me taking photos just four or five metres away.

I couldn't see exactly what it had in its claws, but it kind of looked like a piece of bread. About 50 metres away in another picnic area down the hill, I could see several families also having barbeque picnics. Obviously, they had thrown a piece of bread to feed the currawong - or maybe it had snatched a piece from their picnic table. Only a little while earlier a kookaburra had snatched a sausage from the very hot barbeque plate we were using (you can read about it here). 

My Australian readers should be advised that it is dangerous to the birds and animals to feed them human food. It is not good for them. Visitors to Lane Cove National Park are warned about this via plaques on every picnic table. Unfortunately, many of the birds have learned to be sneaky and easily snatch human food - as we found out with that cheeky kookaburra.

You can read more about Australian birds, and see many more photos of them on my other site, Trevor's Birding.