The environment: science, ethics and communication
My friend in Kelso who invited me to visit the Tawny Frogmouth a while ago and has spotted 75 species of birds around the house to my 50 got in touch a week ago about a Red-tailed Black Cockatoo chick (Calyptorhynchus banksii), saying, “Come and watch the mother feeding it,” etc, and we visited him today for the purpose.
The nest, in a tree hollow as usual, was visible from the back of the house and when we arrived about 3.30 the chick was sitting up, waiting for food:
The number of whales migrating up the coast past Townsville has been steadily increasing, and local residents now catch sight of them from the Magnetic Island ferry quite often. We have never been lucky enough to do so, however, so we booked a whale-watching trip to make sure we did at least see a whale before the season ends.
The tour operator picked us up in the city in his troop-carrier and we went out from Lucinda in his small boat at about 9.00. The weather was absolutely perfect until early afternoon, when a bit of wind blew up (not enough to make us too uncomfortable, just not as nice as the morning) and we had a wonderful day.
Our route took us roughly South-east once we cleared the end of Lucinda’s enormously long jetty, out towards Pelorus Island then South along the Eastern side of Orpheus and into the area between Fantome and Great Palm. (This map might help you keep track of our day.) Continue reading “Whale-watching in the Palm Islands”
On Saturday I was lucky enough to visit the Town Common with a small group which included two keen, knowledgeable birders. Thanks to them, we ended up with a list of more than 50 species from Red-backed Wrens and Spice Finches (10 cm) to Jabirus and Brolgas (130 cm). We were happy that we spotted so many in just a couple of hours but I should note, just for context, that about 280 have been recorded on the Common.
We drove in past the golf club, visiting Payet’s Tower and the two nominated viewing points on the way to Freshwater bird hide, with a few unscheduled stops as one or another of us spotted birds from the vehicle. There is still a fair bit of open water on the Common and we saw substantial numbers of Magpie Geese, including about 150 in a single flock near the Pandanus viewing point. We briefly visited the Pallarenda Conservation Park, too, adding the Orange-footed Scrub Fowl, Scrub Turkey and others to our list.
Here are some of my photographs from the morning.
As most of us know, all of our cultivated bananas are sterile clones and those little black dots in the middle of the fruit are immature seeds which will never develop. Getting a real seed out of a cultivated banana is a really rare event, as we realise immediately when we think about how many bananas we have eaten and how few seeds we have found.
I have been growing Ducasse (sugar) bananas in my back yard for twenty-odd years, occasionally with other varieties, and I hadn’t come across a mature seed in all those years until six weeks ago when I found one seed in each of two bananas from the same bunch. One seed crunched between my teeth but I managed to save the other – roundish, blackish and about 4mm long. Continue reading “Ducasse banana seed – an exceptionally rare find”
The rooftop PV system we installed seven years ago has just passed another good round number – 16 000 KWh – having produced 4 000 KWh since my last update, in September 2016.
The daily average in that period is therefore 5.9 KWh/day, a little lower than the average of the first five years. The drop in output is so small that it’s not really worth worrying about but three explanations come to mind, and all may have contributed to it: