So, this happened to me yesterday afternoon around 5pm, East Coast Australia time.
I was in my study and heard loud bird chirping coming from the front door. I live in a two storey house, the front staircase leading off an open front
porch. Next to the stairs and blocking my view of the street is a clump of thin palm trees (each trunk no more than four or five cm thick, although
they are quite tall and small fronds provide some privacy from people walking down the road).
Anyway, I went to the front door to investigate and saw about a dozen small birds flying wildly around the tree clump at the second storey level. I
often go to that porch for a smoke and I'd never seen a flock of birds show any interest in that particular bit of greenery.
On closer inspection, I noticed that it wasn't just a flock of one type of bird, but at least three. None of them are uncommon, but I could identify a
small nectar drinking variety, a larger species (both male and female were present, judging by the plumage) and a third type, slightly larger still,
with a crest on it's head. Something was greatly agitating them all, they were chirping loudly and fluttering wildly every which way.
Then, one of them spots me and flies right at me, stopping about a meter away and hovering, chirping loudly right at me. It retreated after a few
moments and another took it's place, doing exactly the same thing, hovering in place and chirping at me aggressively.
And then a third and then a fourth.
By this time, I'm pretty stunned. I'd never had anything like that happen to me before and the surreality began to sink in. After about five minutes,
I contemplated going to get my phone to start recording, but whatever was happening, I didn't want to miss any of it. Now, I do have cats, but none
were present and the birds didn't seem to be scared of any sort of predator that I could see...but they were very interested in me and continued to
take turns flying under the porch, chirping at me for a bit and then returning to the branches. Different species of birds. No nests in that
particular clump of trees and again, they have never taken a particular interest in that area before.
I would say that about ten minutes passed in total from the time I went to the porch until all the birds suddenly decided to leave in unison. One
little nectar drinking bird hung around for maybe another minute before flying off as well.
On a hunch, I checked the national earthquake reporting service, but no luck, our last quake happened over nine months ago.
Snakes could be another possibility, but why would these three different species of bird all congregate in one small clump of trees and the proceed
to...chirp at me?
Any ornithologists, professional or amateur happen to guess as to what that whole thing was about?
Pictured: The tree clump in question.
Not pictured: Insane birds.
edit on 12-5-2017 by Unresponsible because: (no reason given)