BORN IN THE USA

Last year we had a visit from Canadian/USA tour group 'Air Safaris International' and just recently, Clare was back with another group of interesting travellers from the USA. Here they are lining up for one of the famous Sweers Island buffets...

Their visit coincided with our newest team member = 'Bluey' the Black-faced Cuckoo-shrike (also known as Shuffle-wings or Blue-Jays, hence his nickname...). This wild bird just flew out of the trees and landed on Lyn's head while she was gardening one afternoon (May 15th 2008). It seemed to want food so we gave it some of the Curlew's cheese, which it ate, while perched on Tex's shoulder...  Overnight, we thawed some mince, as they are mainly an insect eater, in case it came back. It did! And it's been flying in to the dining area each day since! That's 2 weeks now, so we think Bluey deserves a page of his own - click here if you'd like to check out this amazing little personality bird! He catches his own food, and flies around with others of his kind, but for some unknown reason, he has no fear of people and just flies in at his leisure, to sit on the bar and chatter away to the guests! Here he is on one of our American guest's arm -

That's David with his new mate, Bluey!

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________