A Miner Squabble

Acrylic on canvas (Sold)

122 cm W x 122 cm H
When my children were much younger, they used to stand in our front yard waiting for the morning school bus. A tree there was usually alive with squabbling Noisy Miner birds (Manorina melanocephala) expressing ritualised displays, such as flight displays, postural displays, and facial displays. Noisy miners are particularly pugnacious honeyeaters, gregarious, bold, curious and territorial; they forage, bathe, roost, breed and defend territory communally, forming colonies that can contain several hundred birds. Each bird has an ‘activity space’, and birds with overlapping activity spaces form associations called ‘coteries’, which are the most stable units within the colony. The birds also form temporary flocks called ‘coalitions’ for specific activities, such as mobbing a predator. The noisy miner is a notably aggressive bird, so that chasing, pecking, fighting, scolding, and mobbing occur throughout the day, targeted at both intruders and colony members.