By Khama Reid
Updated 9 Jun 2018, 10:48pm
First, there was the exciting
sighting of a black kookaburra in a West Australian backyard. Now bird
enthusiasts in South Australia are talking about a rare white magpie that has
been spotted in the Flinders Ranges.
The bird is mainly white and a
very light brown where it would normally be black. It has been spotted
frequently near a creek about six kilometres north of the town of Quorn.
Quorn resident and bird
enthusiast John Paynter said the magpie does not let people get too close.
"We drove around and all of
a sudden it was sitting right in the middle of the road, picking a bit of
carrion off the road," Mr Paynter said.
"But once he worked out we
were trying to photograph it, he took off pretty quickly."
Mr Paynter keeps birds and said
the white magpie would be at a higher risk of predation than other magpies in
the area.
"Obviously a white magpie is
a lot easier to see than a coloured one, a dual-coloured one anyway.
"I'm hopeful that it
survives, but the chances of that are probably a bit slim with the colour …
these things don't tend to last in the wild but hopefully it will be okay and
hang out for a while."
Birds SA secretary Kate Buckley
showed a photo of the bird to other members and they said that while rare, the
bird was not an albino.
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