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Project Noah Nature School
Crop contents of a larger species of bird. Possible contributors include Australian magpie, Currawongs, Butcherbirds (or maybe even Little Ravens - genus Corvus?) . The mass shows many arthropod parts especially beetle elytra.
On branches of acacia in parkland.
I hope to attempt an analysis of this mix to identify what the most likely culprit might be.
Spotted on Nov 14, 2012
Submitted on Nov 16, 2012
6 Comments
Not at all, it's really the only way to describe it.
Good word for it though. I'll use it if you don't mind.
Not sure where the term came from, that's just what my family and I have always called them. I've had ravens that did the same and I'm sure that Currawongs would do the same thing, I think all insect and raptor birds bring up some kind of "jacket". Though I've never witnessed it with a seed eater or nectivores.
Yep good comments sara. I was thinking that myself after I posted this. Mind you insects are meat too but I know what you mean :) We have been feeding families of maggies here for 15 years now and you're right - they bring up very similar stuff. The thing that surprised me with this was the massive amount. It was huge. Maybe it was expanding because the maggie ones are quite compressed. Maybe currawongs make bigger lumps. You're so right about the owls and TF's there is always lots of little bones and hair. I'm curious about your term "beetle jacket" where does that come from? It's a good description (even though I wore one in the 60's) Our maggies bring them up also when they think there's something better to store... I'll change this to Cracticidae offerings. Thanks.
If it were from any bird like an "owl" for example, you'ed see lots of white bits. And these would be bits of bones that the bird can't digest, and the rest would be made up of hair and such.
This looks like a "beetle jacket" I don't think it's from a meat eating carnivore as it seems to be beetle husks. Birds like Magpies bring them up all the time, they can't digest the husks but also bringing them up like this cleans the crop of toxins.