Thread: A diary of visitors to my back yard

Can anyone tell me is this a small wattle bird? it makes the strangest of noises which is how I came to notice it was visiting. I also had a photo of an eastern spinebill in the same tree at the same time as this one but photo did not turn out well as these bird only seem to bloody visit when there is no detail what so ever in the sky so I can be assured the sky will blow out

It certainly has the same colour plumage as a Wattle Bird & they're quite common around Sydney so I think you could be right.

I can't say I've heard of 'small' variants though.

Best match:

Little wattle bird (Anthochaera chrysoptera): silvery ear patch, cinnamon patch in wing, 27-30cm, a streaked wattle-less wattle bird with whitish ear patch. Above and below, dark olive-brown streaked and speckled white; head, paler, with dark streaks through eyes and from base of bill enclosing whitish ear patch; wing patch (visible in flight), cinnamon; tail, tipped white on outer feathers. Bill, black; eyes, reddish brown; legs: dark grey. Voice: chuckling cackle; "Kraa-cook". Range SEQ to SA, also Tas, open forest and coastal heath, especially banksia and dryandra.

From A Field Guide To Australian Birds, Passerines, author Peter Slater.

Think this little fella is lost!! was on the wall next to the plasma in the lounge room

Thanks Lou, Marcos is looking at the pics over my shoulder. he likes the spider best.

Originally Posted by dullbird

Think this little fella is lost!! was on the wall next to the plasma in the lounge room

That's the rare minature hairy frog .

Originally Posted by dullbird

Think this little fella is lost!! was on the wall next to the plasma in the lounge room

You werent watchin a doco on rainforests and it thought it was the real thing?

nice pics, keep them coming. One suggestion DB... for the pics of the birds, try changing the metering to 'spot' and meter off the bird. This will ensure that the bird exposure is correct even tho it will blow out the highlights (sky). Else you will always get silhouettes when shooting up to the sky.

Originally Posted by stooge

You werent watchin a doco on rainforests and it thought it was the real thing?

nice pics, keep them coming. One suggestion DB... for the pics of the birds, try changing the metering to 'spot' and meter off the bird. This will ensure that the bird exposure is correct even tho it will blow out the highlights (sky). Else you will always get silhouettes when shooting up to the sky.

Stooge last pic of the wattle bird was spot metered on the bird but it was low light and the D80 does not like low light the sky was blown out I brought the sky back a bit on light room...because it was white behind it.