Sat 14th Sep at 0703hrs local I heard my first Channel Bill Cuckoo for the season in North Ryde NSW. Tried to fill in the survey form but found the first section on lat/lon too cumbersome and gave it away.
It could be made a lot easier by just putting in your suburb name/postcode. We are not all computer geniuses, so one statistic they miss out on.
Yes Raven, I heard the first one today, Wednesday 18th. I'm on the central coast at Narara. I didn't see it just heard it I didn't have time to hang around and try to spot it. The sound of Spring!
I have often wondered if the same CBC's return to the same area each year? Seen three large CBC's fly over here yesterday morning with a host of smaller birds in hot pursuit seeing them out of their patch.
Maybe they come back to the same place each year to plant their eggs? Be interesting to know...
Nothing heard or seen of the Common Koel so far, cannot be too far off.
I know what you mean about entering the location. It took me a while to get the hang of it. If you made a mistake at first you might as well start all over again.
I don't know if the same ones return, I only see them sporadically.
Hubby thought he heard a Koel this week in the Pennant Hills area. There is usually online chatter about the first ones so I don't know if it was a koel or a CBC.
There appear to be more CBC's this season that last, heard them calling during the day and often during the hours of darkness too. Last year I seldom heard them.
Heard my first Common Koel for this season on Tuesday 24th September at a friends place in Concord West just after noon.
Tony Abbott talks about "stopping the boats", well my local native bird families would like him to "stop the Koels and CBC's!"...
Three CBC's flew over here just on daybreak yesterday morning, with a horde of Currawongs, Magpies and Noisy Miners in hot pursuit!
Saw my first two CBC's for this coming summer on Saturday afternoon 28th September in Samford Qld.
Samford Valley Qld.
Hi Reflex, the ones Raven and I saw down here must have slipped right past you. I saw another one at work today. I see them only in the morning for some reason.
Four CBC's flew over here at 0640 this morning with the usual natives in hot pursuit. They are very active during the night too, heard a CBC squawking at 0240 the other morning.
As I mentioned previously, they seem to be more active, or there are more of them in this area this season.
The Common Koel calls all through the night too, although none heard in my immeadiate location so far this year. I think the Common Koel returns to the same location each year. There used to be male that sat in a huge tree at the church, not noted this year but was there in the past four or five years.
Was watching the documentary on Sri Lanka last Sunday evening on SBS-1 and guess what I could hear calling in the background as they were visiting the ancient capital? Yes, a Common Koel.
lol, I heard the Koel on that program as well.
" Tried to fill in the survey form but found the first section on lat/lon too cumbersome and gave it away."
Wait, what ? Type your address into Google maps, run your mouse over the screen, press the shift key, lat and long displayed.
or here
If they want "ordinary" people to participate in their survey then it should be KISS, cannot be too much trouble to guage a bird sighting just by suburb name or post code? No need to nail the poor bird down by the wings, so to speak, by the nearest few metres...
The Ibis survey is very user friendly and can be done in around two or three minutes.
Seems to be a very big season for CBC's here, never heard/seen so many before. Common Koel not so common (no pun intended) around here this year. Seldom hear them calling so far this season.
Plenty of Koel's here now Raven. Over the last week or so they have been feasting on a Brazilian Cherry bush which at the moment is full of the small cherry like fruit. Any other bird that comes anywhere near the bush is soon chased away!
Samford Valley Qld.