Wild Emus at The Lilly Pilly Tree

[AntiqueB]

You'll have chicks there!

Your land seems to be a gathering place for many animals. Do you have chicks every year?

 

[briefvisit]

'Do you have chicks every year?'

Good Heavens, no, Antique.

So, the backbone of 'Planet Rothschildi' is the males -- only Toosh Toosh remains -- because they bring their chicks, which they likely hatched on the female's turf, to the house-clearing here.

The flip side is the females, who bring their consorts here. In 16 years, this has only happened twice: Boy Emu and Noddy Big Ears.

And we don't see the chicks grow up because Dad leaves with them immediately after they hatch, and we never see them again.

SE

 

[briefvisit]

And now, you Newer Generation of readers are beginning to really get a sense of 'Planet Rothschildi.' No one else in the world we know of is doing 'this.'

We observe these wild emus through what is in effect a pin hole in the wall. We're not even certain about the equation explained above!

What we know is that A: 7 times in 16 years a 'home-team' male has brought to the house-clearing chicks that he incubated elsewhere (or he'd have turned up with them within hours of them hatching);

and B: 2 times in 16 years a home-team female has brought a consort here, and they have staked out turf, and mated -- and Dad left with the chicks after they hatched.

 

[briefvisit]

Pin-Hole in The Wall



We know that emus travel big distances – the desert emus particularly.



We know that emus ‘change their configurations’ – Dads have and then don’t have clutches. Breeding-pairs form and dissolve. Males ‘try out’ for the position of consort, and don’t make the grade. Flocks ‘shmooze’ in autumn – apparently in numbers and across distances. Single birds come and go.



Number One Emu was once absent for two-and-a-half years. Felicity once for four and a half. Eric was often away for months on end.



The females here have brought perhaps twenty consorts here for ‘try-outs’ over the years. We were fortunate that Felicity once came down the driveway, with a new consort, while we were observing. Further observations showed that she regularly went to and from the National Park (which starts at the top of my driveway) at this time.



The consorts that ‘stick’ become tame (and get a name) then . . . one morning, the pair has left, and that’s it!



The tame-wild emus of the project – Eric the Emu and Toosh Toosh – are someone else’s consorts.



We think that breeding-pairs go on a sort of ‘walkabout’, a ‘honeymoon’ for some time between forming a pair, and later choosing the pasture that they want to command for their breeding. This is a whole other discussion.



But here’s one insight: on one occasion, Eric the Emu turned up with a clutch of chicks already about six months old. (So he missed plum season!) This suggests strongly that he formed a breeding-pair, then somehow wound up – on the female’s turf – so far away that he didn’t eventually wander, with that clutch, back to the house-clearing, until the chicks were relatively old.



So now we restate The Thesis:



it seeeeeems that the male Planet Rothschildi birds recognize the house-clearing as a fine source of food for a clutch, so they bring their clutches here – seven clutches over sixteen years.



It seeeeeeems that the female Planet Rothschildi birds do the normal thing: they form breeding-pairs on their travels; they then travel on a ‘honeymoon’ that we know almost nothing about; and they eventually choose a pasture to defend/breed on. For all the consorts we have met, only twice have our females chosen the house-clearing as that pasture (and those two consorts left with their clutches, and we never saw them again – they took their clutches to somewhere on their ‘memory map’).

 

[briefvisit]

https://imgur.com/ImV1FUX

This consort is 'Groestl' -- named after a crypto currency. He is standing. The female is Felicity.

So, Groestl is a fine example of What We Don't Know. He was brought here. He became tame. He got a name.

And . . . we have no idea! He left with Felicity, and we never saw him again.

Note that this means that, if they successfully bred, the chicks are descendants of Eric the Emu, and really bona fide members of the Planet Rothschildi project. sigh


SE

 

[briefvisit]

102F here yesterday, with a fierce hot wind. The kangaroos are eating the leaves off the fruit trees. The emus were walking around with their mouths hanging open.



The Cheeky Chicks have passed through a number of times. Limpy Chick and Offsider drive them off, but they return just seconds later.



A friend visited. His eyes are ok, so he was able to give me some fine observations on the chicks, whom we successfully attracted quite close with a little wheat.



The chicks are a little different in size, but we are struck by how small they are in comparison to Limpy Chick and Offsider – they’re small!



One chick (my friend says) has a tiny bit of ruff on its neck.



Finally, Offsider is a fine consort. If anything, he is more assertive than Limpy Chick.

 

[Evadig]

102F here yesterday, with a fierce hot wind. The kangaroos are eating the leaves off the fruit trees. The emus were walking around with their mouths hanging open.



The Cheeky Chicks have passed through a number of times. Limpy Chick and Offsider drive them off, but they return just seconds later.



A friend visited. His eyes are ok, so he was able to give me some fine observations on the chicks, whom we successfully attracted quite close with a little wheat.



The chicks are a little different in size, but we are struck by how small they are in comparison to Limpy Chick and Offsider – they’re small!



One chick (my friend says) has a tiny bit of ruff on its neck.



Finally, Offsider is a fine consort. If anything, he is more assertive than Limpy Chick.

Has the dad of the Cheeky Chicks left them now?

 

[briefvisit]

'Has the dad of the Cheeky Chicks left them now?'

Nope. Let's keep watching.

 

[AntiqueB]

Do emus continue to grow a bit all the time?

 

[briefvisit]

Dad and The Cheeky Chicks are here. They got a teacup of wheat, which is not protocol; but the chance to get close to second-year chicks is unique.



So, if a chick gets out of sight of the rest, it begins to cheep piteously. But by the same token, the chicks are now independent enough to wander almost fifty yards from one another.