Whilst I’m a fairly novice bird watcher, Suki the cat had always a great interest in birds for her own reasons. With the exception of cooked specimens, I tended to ignore feathered animals before I moved to Australia in late 2005 to join Mrs. Schmitz in Sydney. This changed soon after we settled in the suburb of North Bondi where the sheer abundance of colourful and exotic species sparked my interest in avian topics. I started to write down bird inspired observations which I put on this little weekly blog about Australia, Sydney and the feathered and not feathered locals.
These seabirds spend almost their entire life at the high-seas, a lifestyle I’m totally unsuited for which I unfortunately had to find out on my first pelagic birding trip. Having a few trips in choppy waters under my belt without having any problems I felt fairly confident that I wouldn’t become a victim of seasickness and I passed on the offered sickness-preventing pill.
You may not need a Butcherbird, like this in Australia widely distributed member of the Cracticus family, but you need surely a butcher for a barbecue or barbie, the term the locals predominantly use. Barbies, not to be confused with the fashion doll, are very popular and deeply imbedded in the Australian way of live, on the same level as the other pillars of the latter – cricket, surf and cold beer.
This owl is one of the most widespread of all birds and known by many other names like White Owl, Silver Owl, Demon Owl, Ghost Owl, Death Owl, Rat Owl, Church Owl, Cave Owl, Stone Owl, Monkey-faced Owl, Hissing Owl, Hobgoblin or Hobby Owl, Dobby Owl, Golden Owl, Scritch Owl, Screech Owl, Straw Owl, Barnyard Owl, Delicate Owl and most notably Night Owl.
