Cockies

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Cockies

Here

in Australia

we have two kinds of cockies

those that scuttle around

the kitchen floor
after dark

and those beautiful creatures

that claim the skies

as their home

The Yellow Tailed

Black Cockatoo family

sat on the edge of the ocean

in the National park

this morning

 

Mrs Cocky

has a white upper bill

and a bright yellow cheek patch

 

Cutie Cocky

her daughter

sits nearby

in a Banksia tree

 

enjoying the seeds

of the Banksia nuts

Cutie reaches out for a nut

snipping off a branch in her way

with her secateur like bill

 

she grasps a banksia nut

in her claws

and severs it from the tree

 

 

what a clever Cocky I am

she raises the nut

to her mouth

like a luscious corn cob

Click the photo

to see the seeds in her bill

 

and proceeds to extract the seeds

 

she then tosses the nut down below

to where I am standing

 

in an adjacent tree

her father sits

Can you spot the gender differences?

My Cocky has a pink rimmed eye

a softer yellow cheek marking

and a grey upper bill

He is also

considerably bigger

 

He too is munching

on Banksia nuts seeds

Mrs Cocky all this time

has been crooning a plaintive song

unlike her usual loud distinctive call

which other days makes me stop

on my walks

and search the skies

for the graceful slow flapping sweep

of these large birds

over the wallum and forest

 

and she leaves her high

look out perch

 

to join her daughter

on a branch

at the edge of the ocean

 

 

which is where
we will leave the Cocky family
the Yellow Tailed Black Cockatoos
the harbingers of rain

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