Botany Nerds Ahoy

Re: fox attack.

Heard an unholy murderous mass chicken slaughter taking place.

Ran out, fox in coop, feathers and blood everywhere.

Fox fled, chickens scattered.

One dead hen in coop.

Managed to round up the others and put then in another coop, put the dead one on some straw in there as well, thinking I would I would bury in paddock at daybreak.

Came back at Dawn and the dead chook was alive- must have been in shock.

Nursed it back to life and now it is a healthy chook.

fwoaar, lucky timing @freeride, whatta jag, glad they survived..
I had a fox here chasing a guinea fowl a few years ago, total sprint race, and i ran at the fox as they passed, and it dug in and snarled hatefully at me for a full 2 seconds for getting in the way..
I could tell it was thinking about pouncing at me, but decided to run off. intense critters.

Not really a botany nerd, but I thought this might be of interest. Some people lined up for four hours to catch a whiff.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-11-12/corpse-flower-rare-bloom-pungent-...

tip-top1 wrote:

really enjoying the insights in this thread,
keep it going fellas,
wish i had more time , my father has a landscape architect degree and loves native plants.
also my grandfather on my mothers side was an avid gardener. i remember being dragged to the redcliffe horse stables as a kid to shovel horse shit for his veggie patch.
good times

tip-top 1. Hi fella.

Your dad has a landscape architect degree and he loves native plants, well, get him on, let’s talk native plants, local native flora etc.

The more the merrier I say. We all love learning, it’s free and contagious and you become wealthy, of the mind that is. All the best. AW

icandig wrote:

Not really a botany nerd, but I thought this might be of interest. Some people lined up for four hours to catch a whiff.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-11-12/corpse-flower-rare-bloom-pungent-...

Icandig. Hi , you are, you just don’t know it.

We had our (Geelong Field Naturalist Club) general meeting in our clubrooms in the Geelong Botanic Gardens this evening, a great speaker from Museum of Victoria, a palaeontologist talking about Jan Juc, and Possos fossils as well as the Puebla Formation at Bird Rock, he was outstanding.

At its conclusion a few of us ventured over to see the Amorphophallus , the scent was absent by this time of the night. It’s was packed with people.

The size of the flower is humongous, but it’s not the largest flower in the world.

Rafflesia arnoldii from Sumatra is. A human can stand in the middle of it.

By SofianRafflesia - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=59608279

I’ve just slid into bed. AW

AlfredWallace][quote=icandig wrote:

Icandig. Hi , you are, you just don’t know it.

I’ve just slid into bed. AW

I identify as Botany curious. Don't really swing one way or the other......That last line though " )

ICD

freeride76 wrote:

Re: fox attack.

Heard an unholy murderous mass chicken slaughter taking place.

Ran out, fox in coop, feathers and blood everywhere.

Fox fled, chickens scattered.

One dead hen in coop.

Managed to round up the others and put then in another coop, put the dead one on some straw in there as well, thinking I would I would bury in paddock at daybreak.

Came back at Dawn and the dead chook was alive- must have been in shock.

Nursed it back to life and now it is a healthy chook.

FR76. Hi mate.
That’s full on.

I’ve got a sensor camera on our chook house, the bloody foxes they prance around the perimeter, clocking up miles turning all the time, obviously salivating as to the contents.
My set up is bullet proof wire on all sides and top and buried below the ground at right angles. ‘ Gallus Palace’ for chooks. AW

seeds wrote:

Aren’t these strange? I gladly plant a couple in my yard if they could handle the conditions here.
https://au.news.yahoo.com/the-extremely-rare-tree-aussies-should-plant-i...

Seeds . Hi mate.

Beautiful small mallee Eucalyptus.

Attempting to grow a plant like that out of WA is fraught with danger.

Fitzgerald River National Park is a must visit for anyone interested in the Kwongan Flora complex, , the level of endemism is approximately 75% compared to QLD Wet Tropics 25%

My opinion would be it’s way too humid where you live. AW

Here’s one for you AW. Despite the name it’s surprisingly hardy, even survives my gardening attempts! This one had a day moth visitor grabbing some refreshments.

Distracted wrote:

Here’s one for you AW. Despite the name it’s surprisingly hardy, even survives my gardening attempts! This one had a day moth visitor grabbing some refreshments.

Distracted . Hi mate. Hope you’re well.

My guess is Darling Lily. Crinum flaccidum. AW

Nice guess AW, you must have come across the Darling Lily on your trips inland? However, this is actually a Swamp Lily, crinium pendunculatum.
Looks very similar, interesting where evolution has taken this genus across Oz!

Lots of swamp lilies in flower around here.

Seen them in brackish environments on river banks- they must have some salt tolerance.

Distracted wrote:

Nice guess AW, you must have come across the Darling Lily on your trips inland? However, this is actually a Swamp Lily, crinium pendunculatum.
Looks very similar, interesting where evolution has taken this genus across Oz!

Distracted. Hi thanks for the confirmation.

The floristics says Crinum sp. straight up.
It was either one or the other. Their foliage looks very similar and your photo had little vegetative parts.
As you’ve stated, very tough plants and we have more species than most would think.
I’m always updating and refreshing my library of reference books.
By sheer coincidence, received this in the mail yesterday mid morning, later yesterday evening you post a lily. Unbelievable. AW

3rd tiger I’ve seen in 3 weeks.
Something got to this one unfortunately.
They’re out and about

This was last week

yep, here too @goofy, big 'un in bird netting, and caught a baby 12" tiger by the back door while tidying last weekend, let it go on the way to Portland, but yep, 1 baby means many more... ours are astonishingly orange bellied.. pretty magnificent in the split second you see them before you leap up the nearest tree..

I love seeing them b6, when they’re not around the house that is..
The shimmering greeny, yellow colours are amazing.

freeride76 wrote:

Lots of swamp lilies in flower around here.

Seen them in brackish environments on river banks- they must have some salt tolerance.

Freeride76. Hi mate . Hope you’re well.

Are they Crinum sp or other lilies ? I’m interested .

The salt tolerance. Hmm. Would you be able to take a couple of photos. Thanks heaps.
My mental picture of Lennox, it appears your biota is in pretty much shape. AW

goofyfoot wrote:

I love seeing them b6, when they’re not around the house that is..
The shimmering greeny, yellow colours are amazing.

yeh, they're cool as. Now I don't have young kids running about, I like them more. And I adhere to the idea that it is better to have a snake that is aware of your movements, than to kill it an have a newby move in. Certainly no shortage of snakes in this neck of the woods, around the drains between Port Macdonnell and Robe.

I still have the snake (1 year ago... 2?) that I met (a tiger) when running to the top of a sand dune at Canunda. couple of feet from my eyeballs, with the slope of the dune, it flattened, I froze, and we stayed like that for about an hour or so.. (or maybe a couple of seconds).. magnificent blacks and oranges, flattened neck against the ground, assuming I'd be cool.. took my teen kids up the dune after I found them, the beast was still there, fucking chilling on top of Canunda's highest dune.. magnificent.

basesix wrote:

goofyfoot wrote:

I love seeing them b6, when they’re not around the house that is..
The shimmering greeny, yellow colours are amazing.

yeh, they're cool as. Now I don't have young kids running about, I like them more. And I adhere to the idea that it is better to have a snake that is aware of your movements, than to kill it an have a newby move in. Certainly no shortage of snakes in this neck of the woods, around the drains between Port Macdonnell and Robe.

I still have the snake (1 year ago... 2?) that I met (a tiger) when running to the top of a sand dune at Canunda. couple of feet from my eyeballs, with the slope of the dune, it flattened, I froze, and we stayed like that for about an hour or so.. (or maybe a couple of seconds).. magnificent blacks and oranges, flattened neck against the ground, assuming I'd be cool.. took my teen kids up the dune after I found them, the beast was still there, fucking chilling on top of Canunda's highest dune.. magnificent.

Goofyfoot, hi mate, long time no speak. Hope you and yours are all well.
Basesix. Hi fella.

Really enjoying both your snake discussions.
We need snakes, lots of them, they clean up stuff, they are good ecological indicators.
Don’t you stand and stare at their majesty, that body , totally evolved to fill a niche.
Survival skills we could only dream of.
The ability to be seen and not seen for various survival applications.
The ability to drop into low torpor, the skill and genetics that calibrates toxin levels in venom for particular environmental conditions spanning a single yearly life cycle.
Sensory skills of orienteering by tasting air borne particulates.
The ability to flatten their bodies to swim across a body of water.

And, we think we are the epitome of animal design, pfff.

What goes through a humans mind when they swing an object to kill one, ?
Not much really. AW

AW question for ya

Mrs Magpie has been working hard with 2 babies, who are growing strong. She's off the nest for a while now, and has developed a flat patch on her lower tummy, which bulges out a bit. We looked up a brood patch, which it could be. She's also getting smaller, thinner, which could be the hard work she's doing. Mr Magpie is noticeably bigger than her now, and they were about the same size before. Could it be anything else?

velocityjohnno wrote:

AW question for ya

Mrs Magpie has been working hard with 2 babies, who are growing strong. She's off the nest for a while now, and has developed a flat patch on her lower tummy, which bulges out a bit. We looked up a brood patch, which it could be. She's also getting smaller, thinner, which could be the hard work she's doing. Mr Magpie is noticeably bigger than her now, and they were about the same size before. Could it be anything else?

VelocityJohnno. Hi mate.

You and your family are great animal observers.
You are totally correct, they have a brood patch. Almost bare skin.
Feathers in that area can create too many variables with regards to the correct amount of heat for incubation.
In a way those feathers would be like a puff jacket blocking heat getting to the eggs.
Magpies are fascinating to observe as you already know.

I’m still chasing up the other stuff you’ve requested, I’m no tech guru, so, Tuesday at our meeting I asked our librarian woman who is a self taught scientist to look through our database and catalogues of presenters and find what I’m looking for.

Did your magpies only have two juveniles?
Our permanents here always have three but tend to lose one every now and then, on the whole three generally survive. We don’t have the dangers and impediments that exist around a city like Geelong, Ocean Grove, Torquay etc..

A first for where I live, a few days ago had an adult male and a juvenile Rufous Whistler both singing back and forth, a joy to watch.
Also, Horsfields Bronze and Shining Bronze Cuckoos, they drop their eggs in our Superb Fairy Wrens nest.
We get Zebra Finches and Diamond Firetail Finches here also. It’s very dry all year, grasses persist in all manner, pastoral or native. AW

Love that rufous whistler call.