Purple swamphen

With their comical young & readily accessible habitat these birds are good photographic value. I enjoyed views of a relaxed parent keeping an eye on a skittish youngster at Lilydale Lake recently. February seems to be the month in southern Victoria to see young birds.

Porphyrio porphyrio melanotus
Lilydale Lake, 3 Feb 2012

Immature bird happily grazing in presence of Mum / Dad (above)
but then felt suddenly spooked.

This goose-stepper was snapped at
Werribee Zoo April 2008

The fellow above and following shots of
swamphen with young are taken at
Karkarook Park, February 2009

Above & below - Jells Park, February 2011

Phaps perhaps? - not Bronzewings again!

Another close encounter with the generally wary Common bronzewing has led me to read further regarding this bird & bronzewings in general. Here's what I have learned:

Firstly, Pizzey says there are 297 species of pigeon and dove worldwide (Family Columbidae) and Australian has 25 of these (3 introduced - can you name them? I was only familiar with the two).

The genus Phaps contains three species, all Australian

• Common Bronzewing (shown here)
• Brush Bronzewing
• Flock Bronzewing - a book given to me lists this among the "100 birds to see before you die" 

Common Bronzewing (Phaps chalcoptera)

Same bird, different aspects
Lilydale Lake

The genus name Phaps does have it's origins in the colour bronze I believe. Apparently there was some jostling about naming rights (a Mr Swainson tried to force his perispera on to Mr Selby's phaps). In a tome called A list of the genera of birds: with their synonyma and an indication of the typical species of each genus by George Robert Gray (1841) there is an appendix: Mr Strickland's commentary (see the relevant paragraph in this Google e-book) which describes this episode.

Other links:
The Phaps chalcoptera page from Birds in Backyards
Wikipedia's Common Bronzewing page which carries this great image of a bronzewing feather. There is also a nice summary of Phaps and related birds here.

Michael Dahlem's Webpage carries some indigenous names for the Common bronzewing and an image of a time when the birds were more plentiful.  See it here:

'This photo is a reminder of the "olden days", when Common Bronzewings
were still plentiful - on this occasion we saw a total of about 50 birds'
M Dahlem, Narrabri NSW

Amongst the University Of Tasmania's collection is this:

Bird painting of a 'Bronze winged Pigeon (Phaps chalcoptera)'
by William Lewis May (1861-1925) Tasmania

Other pages in this blog featuring Common bronzewings can be seen by clicking here, one of which contains a Youtube link to this bit of video taken at Badgers Creek:

Eastern curlew

Is that not the longest bill you have seen on a bird?

Eastern curlew (Numenius madagascariensis)
"Eastern" to differentiate it from the European variety I guess

These Eastern curlew are not common in southern Australia but a few hang around the "world quality" bird sanctuary at Observation Point, Phillip Island. These migratory birds are more commonly seen here during the summer months (Dec - Feb). The protected area is really quite small and vulnerable so we are not keen to get close to these birds but I was treated to clear views from a distance on a warm, sunny Sunday last weekend.

This fellow conveniently arrives next to a
Pied oystercatcher giving an idea of size
(which helps distinguish from the Whimbrel).

It was followed by another ....

and another.

Observation Point (the sandy bit in foreground)
looking towards the cliffs of Rhyll

Sage advice regarding preservation
(a recently erected sign)