Re: Australian parrots (was slide projector}
John Atkinson wrote:
>
> At 17:09 11/04/00 +1200, Moira wrote:
>
> >Michael Barclay wrote:
>
>
> OK Moira, some minor corrections to your correction!
>
> (1) There are several different smallish parrots called rosellas, all like
> you say brightly coloured, of various colours and combinations of colours,
> crimson, green, yellow, blue but not pink or white.
>
> (2) There is, like you say, one very common large white cockatoo (with a
> yellow crest) and several large black cockatoos (with touches of white,
> yellow, or red). But there is also one large bright pink cockatoo (the
> Major Mitchell). And the galah is actually a cockatoo too (a small one),
> which is about half pink and half grey, and gets about the inland in
> enormous noisy flocks. It might not be such a great idea to name your rose
> after them however, since "galah" is Australian slang for a loud-mouthed fool.
>
> (3) The budgerigar is small, but not the smallest of our parrots I think.
> Wild budgies are green, all the other colours have been developed by the
> breeders.
>
> And, like you say, there are dozens of other Australian parrots, large and
> small.
>
Hi John.
Thanks for putting me right. I haven't been in Oz on holiday for almost
ten years and was quoting from memory, as I don't actually have a book
on the Australian birds.
I don't think I had ever grasped there was more than one type of
rosella, and I had plain forgotten the Major Mitchell cockie.
I was also unaware that the Galah was actually a cockatoo.
I am very surprised though that there should be a parrot smaller than
the budgie and would be interested to know what it is called.
I note you say that wild budgies are all green. When we visited a
wildlife park near Adelaide there was a budgie family nesting in a hole
in a fencepost and the male at least I remember as yellow - perhaps only
a half-wild bird?
Moira
--
Tony & Moira Ryan <theryans@xtra.co.nz>
Wainuiomata, New Zealand. (on the "Ring of Fire" in the SW Pacific).
Lat. 41:16S Long. 174:58E. Climate: Mediterranean/Temperate
