For the Birds

I've been saving up some pictures of birds to share. One of the fun things is seeing all the birds here that are new to us. We haven't learned the names of all of them, so if anyone can name those we don't know, have a go. My favorite is still the superb fairy wren. They're so cute!

We've learned that Australia doesn't have white swans, only black ones. They are a very striking bird in the wild. We spotted these off the bike trail the other day, hanging out in the marshlands. I was waiting for them to meet up and make a heart shape with their necks, just like they do in the greeting cards.

 In Melbourne central business district, we managed to come across a few birds.

In a city park, looking for dinner

Some wood ducks probably waiting for bread crumbs

This black swan stalked tourists on the Yarra River boat ride

These two pigeons? greeted us outside of the Melbourne Museum

We took a hike around Lake Pertobe last week. It's the large park I wrote about in another post. It was the middle of a week day, so the park was inhabited mostly by wildlife - most of them birds. Andy had a face-off with a large magpie who looked ready to charge. We both flipped our hoods up and went on our way. The black and blue bird was one of the more interesting ones. I have no idea what kind it is, but it reminded me of a chicken as it came over the bridge.

Why did the black and blue bird cross the bridge?

To meet up with his mate.

There were many, many of these - maybe oyster catchers?

The heron posed for us.

A pelican, Andy's favorite bird.

This duck was sitting pretty - love the green feathers.

Duck, duck, goose?

The fella's lady friend was nearby.

Something we had heard about, and were anxious to visit, were the penguins on Middle Island in Warrnambool. We finally saw them on our bike ride this weekend. During some parts of the year, there's a live webcam where you can follow the little penguins. Out on the point are the cormorants, and to the left are a group of penguins that look kind of like they're sleeping because most of them have their heads tucked down.

A cormorant catching dinner.

In a couple weeks we'll be visiting The Great Barrier Reef, so I'm sure we'll have lots more fish pictures. It will be interesting to see what types of birds live up there as well.