Sylva Francis, affectionately known as the town’s bird lady, has made clear her reasons for feeding birds in her garden. If you have followed her advice and set out food to help local birdlife survive the winter, you may wonder just what breeds of bird are eating the seed in your feeder.
Here are some of the magnificent birds you may see:
Doves: the four kinds common to Newcastle are the rock pigeon, the red-eyed, the Cape turtle and the laughing dove. Doves are monogamous and choose a partner for life, only taking another partner if one of the pair dies. They prefer eating from a flat surface and love eating seed spilled from the feeder. They eat anything ‘seedy’ including pap, bread and rice but not insects.
The rock pigeon is the biggest of these four kinds, and is easy to identify by its maroon and grey colouring with spots. The red-eyed and Cape turtle doves look similar with the ring on their necks, but are differentiated by the reddish wash on the feathers of the red-eyed dove. The laughing dove is smallest and has no ring on the neck.
Sparrows: the three common kinds found in Newcastle are the grey-headed, house and Cape sparrow (mossie). The house sparrow is not actually an indigenous species but is more common today. Sparrows are also monogamous birds.
House sparrows mostly choose suburban areas to build their nests. The Cape sparrow is easily identified by the white C shape on its head and prefers nesting in trees, but can utilise manmade structures to nest. Sylva said grey-headed sparrows were not so faithful and tend to take over nests from other sparrows, swallows and swifts.
Finches: the species common to Newcastle is the red-headed finch. The males have the characteristic bright red head while the females are more dully coloured. Finches also have a scaled pattern of plumage on their breasts. Finches are monogamous, are very common and also use nests of other bird species.
Weavers: common kinds found in this area are the masked and village weaver. In summer, males have a bright yellow plumage and dark mask on the face, and in winter look more grey and drab (similar in colouring to the females). Weavers are polygamous and have multiple partners.
One of the urban legends is that the male weaver builds a nest, which is destroyed if the female is displeased. Sylva said this was not true – the male builds a nest in the early season and the female serves as the ‘interior decorator’ and completes it. On the other hand, if there are no females ready to mate or the nest is poorly built, the male himself destroys the nest.
“Weavers love shredding palm leaves and long grasses. They use these to build a nest with an opening at the bottom, which stops most predators from easily getting in. You do get some predatory birds who can attack weaver nests, like the African harrier-hawk.”
Less commonly sighted, but which still might visit your garden, is the red bishop. Sylva noted these birds also had a beautiful change in colours from season to season.
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