One of the pleasures in my life is birds in the backyard. My door is at the top of a flight of wooden steps and overhanging them are some of the leaves of an umbrella tree. Great name for a tree, eh! In fact when it is raining the large glossy leaves efficiently funnel water onto whoever is passing below. the umbrella tree in flower has the beautiful long red spikes you see in the photos. For some reason the flowers don’t open for a very long time but I guess that some nectar or other atttractive food seeps out of the budlike structures. Lorikeets and Noisy Miners spend a lot of time just licking them. I know because I can stand at the top of my stairs and watch them. If I come out quietly and make some tiny whistles and talk softly they won’t fly away but seem to take an interest in me and pose for photos. Rainbow Lorikeets are clowns and acrobats as are many other parrots. They contort their bodies amazingly to get their tongues onto a flower. My home is a nice place to be.
The place I live in has a few trees and that’s why the birds are attracted
. I’ve always hated the cult of the lawn, where people transform an area of land into green deserts that support the minimum number of life forms. Their only benefit as far as I can see is to allow them to play ball games without getting hurt when they knock one another down. I’m not into ball games.