Pied Butcherbird

Thusday afternoon before sunset, our wandering ex-patient, Butch, suddenly flew into the frangipani and landed beside me. You will recall Butch went blind and we had to keep her in a cage for over a week while we treated her eyes each day. Then she and Cass spent a day singing all around their territory, and both vanished. The birds have a much more complex life than we humans often give them credit for. Taking holidays, visiting friends and relatives, kids' sleepovers - they do it all. What exactly Butch has been up to we may never know.

Our butcherbird group (Butch and Cas are still AWOL) now consists of Dimpy, 3y.o., and Kerry (2y.o.) and two new birds. One seems to be from the intruder group who has changed groups, and we are calling him Terry, and one other who knows us so well we think it must be someone we knew years ago. Dimpy's older brothers, Teddy and Tommy, and his still-older brothers, Eddy and Freddy, are out there somewhere, and maybe this is one of them. The trouble is it's extremely hard to tell butcherbirds apart. Magpies are hard enough, but butcherbirds look almost identical to human eyes.

Poor Sophie magpie has still not let us catch her to take her to the vet for her flu and eye trouble. When I got the cage out, she knew it was for her and squarked and flew up into the tree. Dimpy butcherbird, and Mindy and Monty magpies tried out the cage, seemingly knowing that it wasn't there for them. I did get a bit of a feeling today that Sophie looked a little bit better, so I am keeping my fingers crossed.