winter and spring in one day

Yesterday we thought spring had come to Melbourne, and I was eager to get a nice walk in the sun today with Penny. But winter came back!

After the icy rain and hail, Penny and I set off for Willsmere Park in Kew. I was all rugged up, but of course Penny jumped  into the Yarra for her usual swim.

She waited in vain for me to make my way down the slippery bank to throw sticks into the water.

We saw lots of other creatures also enjoying the park. (Please excuse the low quality of some of the pictures, but I want to show you the variety of park visitors today.)

The kookaburra kept an eye on us but wasn't too worried.

We walked past clouds of insects - maybe midges? They ignored Penny and she ignored them, because she was too busy cleaning her nether parts.

The grass parrots didn't care about us at all, unless we got very close, in which case they shot up into the nearest tree, waited for us to get a few metres away and landed once more nearby.

The ducks, however, were more wary of us, perhaps because they are slower to take flight. Or maybe dogs tend to chase them more often.

It's surprising to realise all this beauty and peace is right alongside a noisy, busy road. Thank goodness for the big wall that keeps most of the noise away.

birds in Darebin Parklands

Yesterday's visit to the Parklands began and ended with birds.

First, as we walked along the creek, in the off-lead area, Penny had to stay on lead because there was a duck with ducklings. (Click on the photo to enlarge it and see the gorgeous little creatures.)



Penny didn't even realise they were there but the mother duck was concerned, so she gathered up her large brood and headed for the opposite bank.



And soon the babies were completely hidden.




After our exercise we made our way up the path and came across a baby crow (actually a species of raven, I think, but I call them crows) sitting quietly in the main entrance. Dogs are supposed to be on lead at that point, but I wasn't confident that everyone would obey the rule, so I called in at the house next door and asked the owner if I could put the baby over the fence into his yard.



He said it had in fact been in his front and back yards during the day, so we presumed it could fly at least a little.

The baby was quite unconcerned about being carried around by a human (wrapped in my jacket).

In the end I decided to put it back in the park, because I'm fairly sure there's a crows' nest in one of the tall trees there. It shook out its wings as I placed it in the tree and observed me calmly as I hurried back to collect Penny from the fence where she was waiting on lead.



I hope I did the right thing. I've checked with a bird-loving friend and she says it's a myth that human handling of a baby bird makes the parents reject it. And I remember one year when a whole nest full of baby crows took turns to tumble onto the ground from their nest in my school, and were subsequently cared for on the ground by the adult birds, over a period of weeks, whilst hundreds of young children played around them.

So I think the parents will come back and care for this fledgling.

Another reason I decided to move it was that two Indian Mynahs were walking around it and I thought maybe they were going to attack it.