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Birds of the Tanami, part 2
Photos by Dave Price
Dave Price snapped these beautiful button quails “dancing for joy under the satellite dish at the Granites mining camp”.
Says Dave: These little fellas are common but very shy. I have been trying to get a clear photo of them for years. This is the first time I’ve managed it.
Also in this slideshow are some lovely close-ups of black-faced woodswallows.
Thanks Dave. I’ve also seen some quails in the hills behind my place, but they’re too quick for me to get a look at. I wonder if they might be stubble quails. Any quail stories would be welcome!
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Beautiful photo, but its not a Buttonquail. If you look closely at this birds foot you can see it has a little ‘spur’ toe- the backward pointing one. All the world’s Buttonquails have this toe missing- they have only three toes which all face forward. The bird in this photo looks like a very fine specimen of a Brown Quail. Many bird field guides mistakenly do not show these as living in the Centre but they do. Like Buttonquail they are reasonably common but hard to see as they spend their days in long grasses until surprised! They get around in little family troops of up to twenty birds, whereas Little Buttonquail tend to be in just ones and twos unless with chicks.