Soon after reaching its destination and finding a mate, they both search for a perfect nest site. It must be a terrestrial termite mound with an active colony of rainforest termites.

Oh! The wonders of nature.

Daryl Barnes

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Crazy Bird Stories tells of the Charming Chat, along with eleven other native Australian birds that can be found around the Mackay district of North Central Queensland. These poems introduce the birds to children and use rhyming words in short stanzas to cell imaginary stories of very strange bird behavior. There’s the Cranky Coot who plays the flute in a striped suit, and the Graffiti Goshawk, who attached chalk to a grass stalk and wrote on a sidewalk. With such a wide range of bizarre behaviors, these verses invite young readers to let their imaginations run free.

Fanciful and informative, this collection of children’s poetry depicts Australian birds involved in unusual and unbirdlike activities.

Have you heard

Of chis crazy bird?

It’s called the Charming Chat.

It sat on a doorn1at with a fat cat in a hat

When in for a chat, flew a furry fruit bat

As the acrobat water rat performed on the back of the wombat

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Where I sat near the high tide mark, I could see the ocean some two hundred metres away in the distance. It was low tide and before too long it would begin to make the long and steady journey back to where I sat. So there was a large area of exposed sea-bed available for the Beach Stone-curlew to explore and to search for food like crustaceans and shellfish. But there was no urgency shown by the bird as it was more concerned with my presence than it was in looking for food.

It could hardly be described as a handsome bird-like that of a Black-necked Stork (Jabiru), Brolga or Great Egret and so would not be high on the list of priorities for selection to feature as the main character in a storybook. So why did I choose the Beach Stone-curlew?

My reason I’ve used it as the main character is to help raise its profile and awareness to highlight the issues surrounding its existence where habitat pressures by man is forcing it to more remote areas of the east coastline of Australia. It’s breeding habits also make it very vulnerable as the female lays one or maybe two eggs amongst the high tide debris.

Welcome to my second book in the series of Crazy Bird Stories. This book is significantly different from the first although it does have some similarities as you will discover.

Since my involvement with Birdlife Mackay, I have had the privilege to witness all the birds that are regulars in our area, including seasonal birds. During this time I have seen at first hand the state of the environment where our birds live and so have identified some key areas where something can be done to preserve and enhance critical habitat. This book highlights the importance of undisturbed tidal flats to the Beach Stone-curlew and its survival.

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Since relocating from Coleraine in Western Victoria to Mackay in North Central Queensland in 1996, I soon discovered a diverse range of habitats including bushland, wetland, rainforest and beaches, all within an eighty-kilometer radius of the town. Of the many bird species that I’ve observed here, I selected twelve to feature in this book.

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