The Bird Bonus to Firewood Gathering.

Greetings All,
Although next and the following years firewood are well catered for at our place the dwindling pile of dry firewood has started to look a bit tragic. When this happens I head off into the trees on our place with my tiny chainsaw and a couple of 10 litre paint buckets to top things up a bit. Currently I am working my way through some Tree Lucerne. There are plenty of dead trees and branches to collect. Every time I go down there I get told of by the resident Quail population (about 40 of them) but this morning I got the same message from a Tui who has moved onto one of the Kowhai that is just coming into flower. Unlike the quail who usually fly of the Tui just sat on his branch expressing his displeasure. After a few bucket trips I got dive bombed, first time this has happened with a Tui. Great! We have all sorts of native birds here and seeing them is a joy. Yesterday my dearly beloved was on one of her walks up our road and had a pair of Karearea (native falcon) pointed out to her by one of our neighbours. Hope to see them and the Kereru that visited a while back here one day.
Regards Grandpamac.

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Originally Posted by Dusty Fog

that tree lucerne is a great all rounder,,talk about grow too

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It certainly is. Bee fodder. Bell Bird and Tui fodder. Kereru fodder. If you see a photo of a Kereru there is often Tree Lucerne in the background. The Quail feed under it. Plus stock fodder in dry periods, nitrogen fixer and self planting. Plus it is decent firewood. My late father propagated about 200 trees for me when we bought our block almost 30 years ago. We planted this all over the place and haven't needed to plant any more since.
GPM.

I have a heap of tree lucerne here on the property. I was standing in one spot the other day and had 6 kereru within about 6-metres of me. Blew me away

My big black bitch Meg copped a bell bird at full tit fair square in the puku department,we were in fern and I believe the bird thought she was just a dark spot to fly through.
Tuis are wonderful critters.saw a pair in Geraldine last year....its the first that have been here for years.

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Originally Posted by Dusty Fog

that tree lucerne is a great all rounder,,talk about grow too

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It doesn't like it down here we are struggling to keep some alive with the weather we are getting. The frost and snow have given it a hammering and not sure if its going to survive yet.

Mine didn’t survive but it grows well closer into Rangiora.

Greetings All,
I didn't see a Tui on our small block until about 15 years after we started planting when one came to visit. The following year there was a pair which nested and now there are heaps. Together with the Kowhai and Tree Lucerne they also like the Eucalyptus, especially E leucoxylon which flowers in around March. When I used to work for a living there was often a Tui in a E leucoxylon not far from my third floor office window right in the middle of Hastings.
Regards Grandpamac.

Yip, been kind of dived bombed (more like a bunch of close high speed horizontal fly byes with a good Tui verbal telling off) by the resident dominant Tui when I had cut down a mature weeping willow that had spilt down the centre a year or so ago. I guess it was used as an advantage point territorial perch tree. If you actually listen you get to know individual Tui calls as they are present around here all year round, without thinking I copy cat a return reply. I sometimes wonder why they moved out of DOC estate to become urbanised. The same Tui is now trying to chase all comers away from my present flowing mature Kowhai trees and seeing him/her besides the others he's a good size bigger than the rest. I can get up to 30 plus of them at a time on a good day when he's away.

latter on when Tui's are done the Kereru will take it's turn.

We had a rural block near Katikati for 17 years and planted several thousand native trees including many Puriri – but we never realised how important Tree Lucerne was for Kereru
Intensive pest control created a haven for birdlife – masses of Tui that loved the Rewarewa trees but we could never keep Kereru on the property until we realised magpies were the problem – horrible aggressive birds
Now living in a small rural street with lots of trees and heaps of Tui – they love sugar water and oranges and are very entertaining scrappers
Good numbers of Kereru at the local Quarry Park – stripping Tree Lucerne and Kowhai – I just planted 20 young Tree Lucerne plants, so I hope the Kereru don’t find them until they get established
Checking out the Kereru yesterday - pic below – four in one small group of trees and others flying around
Attachment 178534

Got up to four Tuis feeding on what appears to buds on a tree at the neighbours, first year we’ve had them around.
We have a steady amount of bellbirds and a whole lot of waxeyes (which mrs Finnwolf feeds a half kiwi fruit outside our window)

But puzzled about the arrival of the Tuis, they’ve been hanging around for about a fortnight now, why this year and not others?

Food trees and shrubs are great but many underestimate how deep understorey leaf litter helps feed the birds. It's where all the invertebrates live and they are where the food chain starts. They feed the bigger insects and small birds that are in turn predated by the moreporks etc. Insects are a big part of a tui's year-round diet for example, whereas flowering are an important but seasonal part of their diet.

Having said that I have a ton of tree lucerne, kowhai here to feed them too. An underestimated tree is the Banksia integrifolia. It's winter flowering so an important part of a nectar feeder's diet :)

Yeah the leaves are the big attraction for the kereru during winter. There's not much around for them then :)

Tuis go mad for Prunus Campanulata ( Tui Tree ) which is flowering now and is spectacular !! The Red flowering gums are also great in low frost areas, gums being in the same family as our Rata and Pohutakawa