6 May 2014

We’ve been trying to show our Canadian visitors all the exotic wildlife we can, listening for the bellbirds and the catbird, trying to remember that a kookaburra sitting on a fencepost is commonplace for us but wildly exciting for them. This morning we heard the black cockatoos for a moment and caught a glimpse of them in a tree near the creek – a few seconds of their mournful call, a black tail swiftly disappearing into the forest shadows.

I’m alone in the garden late in the afternoon, the sun low in the sky, the crisp night air replacing the afternoon’s languorous warmth. The others have gone to town to buy meat for dinner. I’m working on finishing weeding the bed that we edged with turmeric last year. Despite the tough season we’ve had over spring and summer the turmeric has not just sprouted but thrown up healthy leaves, and even flowers, and now risks being strangled by grass and chickweed. I’m making satisfying progress when I hear the call of the black cockatoos, the long cawing in a minor key filling the valley. I look up to see five of them above, the yellow splotches under their tails distinct. They’re flying together with long strokes of the wing when their call changes to a duck-like quack, then back to their normal elongated cry. They’re above a large gumtree on the creekflat when their cries change again, to a parrot-like cluck, then a few notes of a magpie-like warble. They circle the tree then two of them open their wings wide and dive, spiralling down like fighters at an airshow, twisting as they plummet, pulling themselves up and gliding in to land heavily on a branch. The other three take their turns, adding flourishes of fancy flying at will.

Ten minutes later another three cockatoos appear out of the west. They too fly over me, interspersing their calls with quacks and clucks. They approach the gumtree and the calls of all eight birds fill the air. The three new ones plummet and the tree explodes with flapping wings. The cockatoos scatter out over the creekflat, cawing and cackling. The explosion becomes contained, they collect, and land in a different tree. The chaos subsides, the cries die down, the valley is quiet.