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This journal is written by Kuma (Felis catus) and Kuma's owner Y (homo sapiens). We have moved from Japan to Australia in 2011.

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2017-07-24 23:32   Free Accommodation for Wild Birds 2

Y (Kuma's owner)

Nearly a year ago, my husband made a bird nest box and hung it onto the tree in the backyard.

* Free Accommodations for Wild Birds [Sept.22, 2016]

Pale headed rosella

My husband and I were expecting that some birds were going to use it. I saw two Pale-headed Rosellas visit the nest box quite often but they have never used it. I saw them peeking into the nest box and noticed that the hole of the nest box is too small for them.

Next Box

The nest box is set on a branch high above the ground and it's not easy to replace it. Then, my husband decided to make the hole bigger without removing it from the branch. He grabbed a reciprocating saw and climbed the ladder. As you can see in the picture, it was quite high.

nest box

He made the hole bigger and added a small perch under the hole.

The renovation is done!


= The stylish nest box is for rent! =

One bedroom with high ceiling.

The entrance hole size is just a good enough size to go in and out, and there is a perch for supporting your kids when they leave the nest.

There is a beautiful forest and two water basins near the nest box and a human's house in front. Therefore, there is less chance of attack by aggressive ravens, and a safe place to raise your family.

The humans in the house keep cats but they are indoor cats and you don't have to worry about them.

No bond needed.

Available any time.


nest box

| | Category Birds

2017-06-27 22:08   My Drawing Project

Y (Kuma's owner)

What type of kid were you when you were small? I was a kid who always drew. I drew every day. If I ran out of paper, I would even draw on a small space of a newspaper. I had several aunts and uncles who were teachers. They knew I was addicted to drawing, so they gave me paper (mostly extra English examination papers), which they were going to discard. I was an animal lover (still am) and I loved to draw animals.

In Japan, there is an old saying that the soul of a child of three years old will be the same as when they reach 100 years old. In my case, it was true. I still love animals and drawings. The difference between when I was a small kid and now is that I don't draw pictures now. I have sometimes suddenly felt like I wanted to draw a picture but that feeling didn't last long. I don't know why I could draw so many pictures when I was small.

One day, I found a Twitter account of a professional artist who particularly likes drawing birds picture. Her name is Rachel Hollis; her drawings are amazing and I suddenly felt like drawing pictures again.
They say that if you want to draw pictures well, you should draw every day.

Long ago, I decided I would paint pictures every day but it didn't last long. At that time, I was using watercolours. It was a bit awkward every time I finished painting because I had to clean the pallet. Yes, I know, I was lazy.

Coloured Pencils

Then, I remembered that I have lots of coloured pencils. When I quit the company where I used to work, my colleagues gave me a deluxe coloured pencil set. I haven't even used them! I had thought that my favorite artist, Rachel Hollis, used watercolours but I read her website and noticed that she uses coloured pencils.

I have been taking lots of photos of birds. I have a water bowl in the backyard and take birds picture almost every day. Maybe I can use those photos. So, I have decided that I will spend at least 10 minutes drawing every day. If I make a strict rule for myself, I am not able to keep it.

| | Category Birds

2017-04-19 05:10   The questions have been solved!

Y (Kuma's owner)

One day, a friend of mine visited me and showed me the application of iPad/iPhone she had just bought. It was the application of wild bird's reference named "The Morcombe & Stewart Guide to Birds of Australia."

It looked really convenient, and if I had had an iPad it might have been useful when I went out, but at that time I only had an iPhone. I really wanted it but I thought the screen of the iPhone was too small to see an illustrated reference. I wanted to see the pictures with a bigger screen.

I'm not sure how much time has passed since I saw the application, but I still clearly remembered it and still wanted it, and the opportunity finally came, I bought an iPad!

Yay, I've got an iPad!

I was happy like a child who has got a new toy. What I did was of course buy the same application that my friend bought.

When I was small, I always looked at illustrated reference books because I liked science. The feelings I had when I was small came back. I was a kid who remembered all the names of animals which were in the illustrated reference books. My memory is not so good now, but I can still remember the names, I think.

After I finished installing the application, I looked at the alphabetical index carefully one by one. Every time I found the birds I knew, I was happy and said to myself "Yes, I know it!"

I saw the application nodding or talking to myself. If I was seen by someone, I would have been thought of as a strange person.

The first thing that I wanted to do with the application was find out two birds' names.

Since I have moved to the current house, I have seen big birds walking on the turf. The first time I saw one, I thought it was a hawk. The colour was mostly dark brown and it had a long tail. I described the bird (I don't think I could describe it very well) and asked my Twitter followers, but nobody knew.

My second question was the name of birds that sometimes sing in the backyard. I heard the song but I have never seen the bird. I only knew their song and it sounded like an owl but it always sounded in the daytime. It sounded mysterious and I wanted to know the name of the bird.

It seemed easy to solve the first question, I know their looks: big, dark brown and a long tail. There are so many birds on the application, it seemed to take lots of work to find out the bird I was looking for. I looked up birds alphabetically and when I reached "C" I saw a familiar bird! I finally found the bird, it was a "Pheasant Coucal." There was the value of buying an application. I noticed there was a button to listen to their songs and I tapped it.

What I heard was the song I had been looking for!

So, the birds I had been looking for were not two kinds of birds, they were the same birds! The questions that I had been asking were solved at once and I feel so good.

Thanks for the application.

| | Category Birds

2016-12-06 01:33   The nesting of the Superb Fairy-wren

Y (Kuma's owner)

I love birds. There are lots of wild birds around here and I see them every day. About one month ago, I noticed that my hanging basket was getting poor-looking day by day. I wondered what happened to my basket.

Superb fairywren

A few days later, I saw a tiny brown bird pulling a fiber from the hanging basket's palm. Well, I was not happy with the shabby hanging basket but once I noticed the reason of the losing fibers, I felt happy.

Superb fairywren female

The birds were Superb Fairy-wren. They are tiny and beautiful birds, especially the males have beautiful blue feathers. Yesterday, I heard a little peep from the hedge. I wish I had a 200mm lens of my camera.

Superb fairywren male

| | Category Birds

2016-09-22 04:15   Free Accommodations for Wild Birds

Y (Kuma's owner)

My husband and I love birds. We made four nest boxes last year and put them up in the trees in the yard.

bird nest

We didn't expect the birds to use those nest boxes last year but it may be they will use the boxes this year. I have seen a pair of Pale-headed rosella come and peek into the nest box several times. I wanted to tell them how good those boxes are.

bird nest

The box has a one bedroom with a stylish circle shaped entrance. The nest box is a simple design and it's in harmony with nature. The walls are made of natural timber with no artificial chemicals and there are some tiny holes to get fresh air. The location of this nest box is high enough to prevent an attack from predators. There are nice branches around the nest box and they are very convenient to take a rest. When your kids leave the nest, these branches would be a nice place to practice flying.

a water bowl for wild birds

The water bowl which is always full of clean water is under the tree. You can enjoy taking a bath anytime you want. You don't need any rent fee or deposit. It's completely free.

We are looking forward to your visit.

bird nest

| | Category Birds

2016-09-08 04:51   Regional Dialects in Japan

Y (Kuma's owner)

My husband and I had guests from Japan last month. It was fun to have guests, and we enjoyed chatting. It's usually nice and easy to talk in my mother tongue, however my Japanese is standard and the guests' were Tosa regional dialect. This was a bit awkward. Honestly, I couldn't understand 100% of what they said. My brother-in-law has an Aussie friend who had lived in Tosa (Kochi-Pref.). He can understand the Tosa regional dialect more than I do.

I had learnt Spanish a little. One day, I turned on the TV and saw an educational channel of Italian. On TV, two tourists were talking about where the museum was. The surprising thing was I could understand what they were saying.

Then I thought why do we call all the dialects in Japan Japanese? There are various dialects in Japan. Recently, the dialects are replacing standard Japanese little by little where people around the capital city Tokyo speak Japanese. Therefore, everybody understands or speaks standard Japanese but dialects still remain.

I heard that if someone who speaks Kagoshima (South island of Japan) dialect and someone who speaks Tohoku (North part of Japan) dialect meet and talk, they cannot understand each other but we call all these languages Japanese. I don't know why? I guess that the difference between Kagoshima dialect and Tohoku dialect is bigger than Italian and Spanish.

It's interesting that there are so many dialects in such a small country.

| | Category Birds

2016-09-04 22:25   The wild life around me

Y (Kuma's owner)

Australia is a great place to observe wild life.

I have seen an advertisement which was written as "Let's get into the nature!" How an adventurous and attractive catch phrase! If you would like to see wild crocodiles or dingoes, maybe it's right. You better go into the wild nature. If you would like to encounter smaller and much safer wild animals, you don't have to go there. You are able to enjoy wild life even in a residential area. The wild life comes to see you.

Rainbow Lorikeet

The most common wild animals are birds, especially the Rainbow Lorikeet, which is common in Queensland to South Australia and Tasmania.

I remember that a woman who came from Italy was talking about lorikeets excitedly. She said she saw colourful birds on the veranda where she rented an apartment. She looked happy to have lorikeets.

After a week, she didn't look so happy with them. I wondered what made her change? She said she has got many bird droppings.

Galah

I heard similar stories from others as well. Firstly, people who come from overseas are excited to see colourful birds. These colourful birds like the Rainbow Lorikeet, The King Parrot and The Galah easily get foreigners' attention. People tend to pay attention to its colours, and then they will notice what will be left after these birds left. I live in a single house and there is a backyard which wild birds love. I cannot see what they drop on the lawn, so I don't care.

King Parrot - male

However, I experienced a similar thing as the Italian woman did. When I moved to the house I live in now, I saw a big white parrot flying over the roof. It was a Sulphur-crested Cockatoo and it was screaming while flying. I think it's suitable to use the verb "scream", it wasn't singing or chirping, it was definitely screaming. I cannot describe their way of singing, it's more like a dinosaur. I sometimes think their way of screaming might be similar to the Pterosaur's.

Rainbow Lorikeet

Oops, getting back to what I was writing, I was very happy to see Sulphur-crested Cockatoos. They looked gorgeous and beautiful. They were noisy but still attractive. I had some spare feelings at that time.

Scaly-breasted Lorikeet

Three years passed, and I realised that they are pranksters. One day, I glanced at the window and noticed that two Cockatoos were picking the tulips and hyacinths. Those flowers were the result of my efforts. This area is subtropical, therefore I had to keep the bulbs of tulips and hyacinths in the refrigerator for a while, otherwise they wouldn't bud. I spent lots of time on them and just as they started budding, those pranksters came and bit off petals. Later they also came to our backyard sometimes and bit the garden bed's timber or flowers.

Sulphur-crested cockatoo

I'm not happy with wild birds biting off the flowers but try to think that this land is originally for them. This is like paying tax for nature. Actually, I love wild birds and I want them to come to our backyard, that's why I change the water in the basin in the backyard every morning.

Well, I want them to come but I don't want them to bite my flowers. If so, what should I do? Things don't go as I want to. That's nature.

Sulphur-crested cockatoo

| | Category Birds

2016-07-22 04:33   Noisy Friarbird

Y (Kuma's owner)

People love birds because they are pretty and they can sing beautifully.

I love to take picture of wild birds. I always upload bird's pictures to my twitter account. My favorite bird is a Galah, so I upload the Galah's pictures a lot. Their pink feathers attract people. Superb Fairy-wren is a very small bird and the male has beautiful blue feathers as well.

One day, as I always do, I looked in the backyard to take pictures and found a bald-headed bird. It was a Noisy Friarbird. I remember I have seen him sometimes. Once I saw him, his unique looks caught my attention and I couldn't forget him. He has a naked head and that makes him look like a vulture.

Noisy Friarbird

When I upload colourful or pretty bird's pictures, people retweet them. However, nobody retweeted the Noisy Friarbird's picture. Maybe nobody liked him. Well, I can understand what people thought who saw the picture of the Noisy Friarbird. I think the Noisy Friarbird puts people off with their appearance.

In Japanese, the Noisy Friarbird is Zuguro Hage Mitsusui which means Black bald-headed honey eater. "Hage" (bald head) is a rude word. I cannot use this word to describe someone. I don't know why ornithologists use this word for this bird. It's a precise expression but I feel sorry for them.

The first time I saw him, I thought he was weird. After I saw more of him, I've been getting used to him. Once I got used to him, I feel familiar with him. To be accustomed increases the familiarity.

I remember my friend who saw the movie "E.T." and said that ET is pretty. At that time, I hadn't seen "E.T." and I thought that creature in the movie was ugly and couldn't understand why my friend said it's pretty. Then, I went to the movie theatre to see "E.T." Oh, it's not so ugly, is it? What made my image of E.T. change? I think it depends on experience, how long or how much do I know it.

Now I know Noisy Friarbirds well. They are regular visitors in the backyard. To me, they are pretty and whoever may say they are ugly, I like them.

| | Category Birds

2016-07-11 04:59   Homophone words

Y (Kuma's owner)

Long ago, my friend took a job interview in Tokyo. She said the company she had visited was creating new names for new products. What an interesting job! I had never thought that there's a company that creates new names. There are lots of companies that produce products and they have to name their products but it's not easy. They cannot use the same name that another company has already used. Therefore, some of them ask the company that my friend visited to create a new name. I heard that they find a name which has no bad meaning. There are so many kinds of language in the world and I think it would be so hard to find suitable words.

I sometimes notice that there are the same pronunciation words all over the world. One day, I was told that my twitter account name "Kuma" has a bad meaning in Swahili. A man who can understand Swahili told me that but it's too late to change my account name, so I still use the same name. In Japanese, Kuma means a bear.

There's an almost same pronunciation word between Aussie English and Japanese as well. It's "bugger". I sometimes hear my Aussie friends say "Bugger!" when they make mistakes or when things don't go as they expected.

The first time I heard "Bugger!" , I was surprised because this sounded almost the same as "Stupid!" in Japanese. I turned around and looked at my friend. He said "No, no. it's not you, I'm saying it to myself."

I think we should be careful with words that come out from our mouths unintentionally or instantly. If you have a habitual saying of "Bugger!" and you have a chance to go to Japan, you have be careful. I'm sure that Japanese who heard you saying "Bugger!" would misunderstand you.

There is also a partially common word between English, German and Japanese. It's the word "so". I don't think it's 100% the same but on some occasion it's used with nearly the same meaning.

Isn't it interesting? The world is so huge but people from different countries use the same pronunciation word.

| | Category Birds

2016-04-24 05:30   A human being in a cage

Y (Kuma's owner)

One of my daily jobs is taking care of vegetables. I grow vegetables in the backyard and in a veggie patch. My veggie patch is an uncommon shape, it's a Decagon-shaped veggie patch. I wrote about this veggie patch on my journal dated 10th January.

This veggie patch is surrounded by net. The net protects vegetables from pests and Ultraviolet. When I go into the Decagon-shaped veggie patch, I feel like I'm a bird because it looks like a big bird cage. Actually, I saw the similar shaped bird cage at a zoo.

vege patch

When I'm in the veggie patch for watering, sometimes birds come and walk on the top of the veggie patch, so I can see them from underneath. The interesting thing is, they don't mind me. They are cautious of their surroundings, something above them or something aside them, but not underneath. I'm not a biologist, but I just guessed that birds need to pay more attention to what's above because of predators coming.

Some birds notice me and look down at me. A human being is in the cage and birds are outside of the cage. It's like having the shoe on the other foot.

Usually, we cannot see bird's feet from underneath, but I can see their soles. This is a unique type of bird watching, isn't it? All right, I'll be a bird soles watcher!

Though I'm in the cage I still believe that I'm a bird soles watcher. On the other hand, what do birds think? Maybe they think they are human being watchers. They watch me with the same feeling as people watch animals at zoo.

"Look at that human being!"

"Her feeders are full of vegetables, this human being must be a herbivorous.

" It's called a vegetarian, you know?"

I feel like I am able to hear the conversation of wild birds on the veggie patch.

| | Category Birds

2016-01-12 08:00   Colourful guests

Y (Kuma's owner)

There are lots of birds here in Australia and some of them are colourful.

This photo is of a Rainbow Lorikeet (hereafter referred to as Lori), which are commonly seen birds around here. The first time I saw them, I was amazed by their colours. They are red, orange, purple, green and yellow. What a daring design!

Rainbow Lorikeet

Their characters are cheerful as well as their colours. Usually, they go around in pairs. A pair has a close relationship. Once they encounter a competitor for food, they don't hesitate to confront their foe, even if it is bigger than them, like a Galah. Sometimes, they have a little skirmish with other Loris as well. Their skirmish is very noisy but it is only for a short period of time. They just shout at each other and then it ends.

Rainbow Lorikeets taking a bath

I have a water bowl in the backyard. Loris love to take a bath.

One day, I saw a Lori that had a bad leg. He tried to get to the rim of the water bowl but he couldn't make it. The water bowl was a kind of pottery and the rim was slippery. After thinking, I picked up some branches and placed them on the water bowl. Since then, I haven't seen the bad legged Lori, but various kinds of birds have come. I hadn't seen a pigeon drinking water there before, but along with Loris, pigeons come to the water bowl now.

Crested pigeons

Today is very hot. I have finished cleaning the water bowl. It's all ready, so I'm waiting for the Loris to come.

| | Category Birds

2016-01-04 03:00   The Backyard Singers

Y (Kuma's owner)

I have been searching for the name of this black bird.

Willie Wagtail

He sometimes visits my backyard. His song was nice and I wanted to know the name but I couldn't find it. I have uploaded this picture to my Twitter account expecting that someone will know the name. My expectation was right, two of my Twitter friends let me know the name of this bird. It was a Willie Wagtail.

Thanks to my Twitter friends!

After that, I had another singer who can sing beautifully. It was a Gray Butcherbird.

Grey Butcherbird

He had a beautiful voice. Every time I hear his voice, I try to take a video to record his melody but he always comes near the window or on the pinch hanger. I want to record him somewhere on the tree, you know. Somewhere in nature. It doesn't look nice to see a singing bird on the pinch hanger with washed socks underneath. I wonder why Grey Butcherbirds come close to humans? I have searched for a Grey Butcherbird's video on YouTube. There were several videos and I noticed that some Grey Butcherbids sing on the balcony or handrail of the veranda. It almost looks like saying "Look, I can sing more beautifully than any other birds!"

I'm looking forward to seeing him on the backyard tree next time, not on the pinch hanger.

| | Category Birds

2016-01-01 00:03   My first writing

Y (Kuma's owner)

The end of 2015, I have seen a lots of hashtag #accomplish on Twitter.

I asked myself "What do I want to accomplish in 2016?".

I listed up some goals that I wanted to do. I wanted to draw pictures well, play the piano, grow vegetables, gohiking, do calisthenics and write a journal in English. No, no wait. There were so many goals. I knew I should not begreedy. So I have chosen two goals. Drawing pictures and keeping a journal in English. Maybe an illustrated journal is agood idea too.

Well, the introduction became too long.

Here is my first English journal with a photo.

This photo was taken this morning with a compact camera I bought last December. Technologies are advancingremarkably. I could even take a bird which was walking far from me with this small camera. I'm very impressed.This birdis a Peaceful Dove. The Peaceful Dove is a small bird and has light blue eye-rings. They are cautious, I always have tomove slowly otherwise they fly away.They are also one of the birds that I want to draw because I like the pattern of theneck and eye-rings. It was nice to have a Peaceful Dove as the first guest in the backyard this year.

I hope 2016 will be a peaceful year.

Peaceful Dove

| | Category Birds

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