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This emblematic and charismatic Australian bird with its wonderful 'laughing' call (familiar to anyone who watched Tarzan movies), is really a giant kingfisher. It is a fierce predator of lizards, snakes, small birds, rodents, insects.... basically, anything it can catch and subdue by pounding the prey on a branch with its big beak. Kookaburras adapt well to towns and cities, and readily become tame, taking meat scraps from fingers (gently). These kookies were on the campus of the University of Wollongong, on the southeast coast of NSW. A smaller, more colorful species, the blue-winged kookabura, is found in the tropical north of Australia. |
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