Welcome to a new year with new birds. To kick us off, I thought we’d spend a few weeks introducing you to some fun words unique to the ornithological world. But first, we should meet our bird, the Galah (Eolophus roseicapilla).
These little buggers will be a familiar sight to just about every Australian. With their pink plumes, playful crest and distinctive grey flanks, they’re hard to miss. The fact that they tend to pal around in large flocks (sometimes 1000 birds strong) and make a nuisance of themselves as they strut about on the ground, means they’re rather conspicuous.
While the word ‘galah’ has earned itself a place in the Australian vernacular as an insult for an annoying idiot, like all parrots, Galahs are fairly intelligent and inquisitive birds. They form strong pair bonds with their mates, and also play an important role in seed dispersal for many native plants.
Galahs gained some public favour last year when a picture emerged of a flock on a powerline maintaining social distance.
Turns out that while they like to get about in flocks, during the non-breeding season they also like to keep their personal space before they pair up.
But we’re here to learn a fun word, and this week’s word is ‘zygodactyl‘. This word pops up all the time when it comes to describing a bird’s toes. You see, birds have a lot of different ways to arrange their toes. The most common is to have three toes pointing forward and one pointing back (Anisodactyl). But parrots are different, they go in for the two forward two backward arrangement.
This is known as being zygodactyl. Other birds like Woodpeckers, Cuckoos and Raptors also have this toe arrangement. When parrots combine their toes with their hooked beaks, it makes them ace climbers, and they’re great at scampering up vertical tree trunks and can even hang upside down, because why not.
03/01/2021
Bird of the Week 
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