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Art and Animals
Jurassic Squawk
Swapping one medium for another
As I type this, three hornbill friarbirds (Philemon yorki) are feeding in the lillypilly in my garden. Their conversation is uncharacteristically subdued — hornbill friarbirds are usually loud and ebullient. Perhaps they don’t want to alert other fruit eaters to the goodies. Or maybe these are the shyest friarbirds on the Atherton Tablelands.
When I lived in the rainforest, I liked to record the sounds of birds and insects in the morning and evening choruses. A few of those recordings appeared on ABC Off Track’s ‘Earworms from Planet Earth’ series. One of them opened this episode.
But now I live in town and the sounds of wildlife have been replaced by trucks and cars and power tools. Every time I get out the digital recorder or mobile phone, the other noises intrude and overwhelm the sounds of nature.
So I thought I’d try another form of recording: art.
Three of the five Australian species of friarbird — hornbill, noisy, and little — occur within a short distance of my place in north-east Queensland. To see the other two, I have to travel a bit further. Helmeted friarbirds and silver-crowned friarbirds are common across the Gulf country and Top End. Silver-crowned friarbirds also occur on Cape York Peninsula.
