Diamonds and Depression
This bird is a Diamond Firetail Finch.
Wind gusts reaching 60 kph blow the Diamonds off the birdbath. Used to being at ground level to feed, the Firetails find protection clustered in thick Wonga Vine. Inside the tangle, these finches have roosting nests. It’s where they preen each other, chatting until the raised dust of a windstorm dies down.
At dusk, finches cram inside spherical enclosures different from the breeding nests. They like the closeness, the security of sleeping massed together.
These birds are too pretty.
The human world steals beautiful things.
There used to be plenty of Diamond Firetails in South Australia. During the 1950s in the Mount Lofty Ranges, these dainty finches were almost hunted to extinction. Captured to be caged birds, they didn’t do well on their own, pining for their flock and communal roosting nests.
Huge flocks of Firetails used to live in the Atherton Tablelands as well. They were completely wiped out, either by trapping, loss of habitat or both.
Firetails, also called Diamond Sparrows, only live where there is good tree cover near abundant water. In 3 years of devastating drought, I’ve tried to hang onto my garden. I’ve never let the birdbath go dry either. These finches adopted my home as theirs. Since May this year the birds have bred repeatedly. They’ve made a flock.
A flock of shining Diamonds that don’t let duststorms stop them getting a drink. To see them hop back to the birdbath for the fourth or fifth time in a minute is inspirational. Despite what humans have done to them, they persist until they get what they need.
Firetail Fiches pull together in tough times.
It feels like an Australian thing to do.
Social media is full of stories of Aussies helping each other out in fire-ravaged areas. The fire-fighters, volunteers, friends, family and strangers all do their bit to get others through the devastation.
It’s heartening, it gives us hope.
The sky is smoky most days now. Hazy and out of focus, I hate to think what the weather will be over Christmas and New Year.
It’s just under 40 degrees as I write this on the 10th day of the summer.
Outside my windows, finches have their beaks open. Wallabies drink from the birdbath, so parched they allow me to sit outside and watch them.
All the native animals and birds are suffering.
We’ve lost hundreds of koalas, maybe thousands in the fires. We’re losing our national icon. A friend of mine had a koala stay for a week in the tree outside her bathroom. How gorgeous is that? I can’t imagine a world without wild koalas, let’s hope they don’t go the same way as pandas.
A scorching summer filled with more drought, extreme bushfires, raised dust, wild winds, smoke haze and dry storms?
That’s what I fear.
Streaks of rain fall in the distance, but it’s so hot it evaporates before hitting the ground. Watching storm clouds drift over or skirt around our property is disheartening.
We’ve had 4 dry electrical storms in a fortnight. Lightning strikes the ground starting new fires without dropping the rain needed to extinguish them.
Last Wednesday, the Sydney Morning Herald stated we have triple the chance of more intense heatwaves thanks to global warming.
The same global warming our leaders still deny.
No soaking rain for 39 months and the spring just gone was the driest since records began. It was the second hottest three months of spring in 120 years.
This big dry spell is a climate change emergency.
Looking at the Bureau of Meteorology website, I feel sick reading they expect temperatures to soar and less than average rainfall again. Four drought summers in a row when I don’t know how my husband kept our cattle alive through the last 3.
The official fire season started on December 1st.
But we’ve already had 6 weeks of infernos.
10 million hectares have been burnt out.
More firestorms rage out of control each day.
Our farm is in a long valley bordered by mountains on both sides. We have eucalypt woodlands, cypress pine forests, even hills never cleared of native vegetation. The slopes are carpeted with fallen tree limbs and decades of leaf litter. There’s so much fuel on the ground it would be difficult to control a blaze.
This weather makes me nervous.
Australian Christmases are a time for outside BBQs, cold beer, lashings of food, beach picnics, running under sprinklers and jumping in pools. Water restrictions mean people can’t fill pools. Total fire bans make lighting BBQs illegal. Fines apply.
Still, the Firetails come to drink and bathe every other hour.
I see them flit and fly and drink and graze and chirp.
In 2020 or beyond, when this wretched dry spell ends, these sparrows with spotted sides may go back to dams, rivers and creeks spilling over with water. They’ll make flocks with thousands of birds, making whole communities of sparkling diamond brightness.
I hope a few finches stay on; some of the 80 or so Firetails that hatched here and made my home theirs.
When I’m down about the future of the farm and our planet, I watch these birds. No matter the weather, they’re determined to keep going against the wind.
I can’t stay depressed when their Zorro masks turn them into small avengers.
I don’t have diamonds on my fingers,
but I do have Diamonds decorating my garden.
