April Meeting

Wed 10 April 2019 07:30pm

Jack Holland - The Crescent Honeyeater
Geoffrey Dabb - An overview of our grassland birds

Jack Holland will first give a short Bird of the Month presentation on the Crescent Honeyeater.

Geoffrey Dabb will give the main presentation entitled: Hail to thee, Blithe Spirits! – an overview of our grassland birds, including a description of the large breeding influx in the recent summer at the Parkwood Road site, which attracted considerable observer interest.

As defined for the purpose, this group of 9 species (one introduced) includes larks, pipit, songlarks and grassbirds. The talk will discuss taxonomy, occurrence and identification issues -and contributions of authors and artists, from John Gould to Tim Low. Variable plumages will be considered, particularly in relation to the Brown Songlark, an interesting species and an irregular breeding visitor in our area. The female and young of this species present observers (and bird illustrators) with a serious challenge. Few good photos are available because the conspicuous male is the usual target of photographers.

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