Imagine the scene: seriously quiet, desert country, muted browns and greys, soft light as the sun is just rising and then a colourful parrot family turns up to drink at the dam.
The male Red-rumped Parrot is fluffing his feathers beautifully, including his red rump, while the female drinks. The two birds in the background are also males. I was beneath my fabric hide on the bank of the dam. I’d carefully positioned myself away from the tracks showing where the kangaroos made their way to water.
I was at the wonderful Snape Reserve in the Wimmera, just out of Dimboola. What a magnificent place. I was blissfully lucky to visit the reserve with a group of friends from Knox Photographic Society, and that luck was increased many times when I met the wonderful Sharyn who is president of the management committee.
I saw dozens of species at the reserve from tiny Mistletoebirds to comically magnificent Emus and I’m feeling quite desperate to get back. I have more photographs to share from this visit but it has been a week of very mixed emotions and as it is past midnight in this part of the world I must head to sleep.
Happy birding, Kim
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I adore the red-rumped parrots. We don’t see them at home but I do see them by the lake and, for reasons unknown, often saw them at my neurologist’s office. He has since retired and the current one has no birds at all. One of my sisters in law can never remember their names so refers to them as bum birds.
I’m fond of them too EC, something about the flash of colour that glints among the grasses. That’s very inconsiderate of your new neurologist, and I shall think of the parrots with a new name after your sister-in-law’s comment!