Larry's Gallery:   Noisy Miner (2/7)

PASSERIFORMES: Meliphagidae

Manorina melanocephala  

Noisy Miners have the highest fledgling feeding rate known among birds, wrote the late great ornithologist, Graham Pizzey, in 1988.

"As the female noisy miner builds a nest, she advertises its position by flying to it with her head conspicuously raised. Males are drawn by this display and as many as seven males may regularly visit the nest at this stage and several may copulate with her...

"...After the young hatch, many males may join the female in feeding them. At least twenty-two different males were seen to visit one successful nest, and the visits are remarkably frequent. Collectively, males may make as many as fifty-five feeding visits an hour to a nest with nestlings, carrying tiny insects."*

*Pizzey, Graham (1988). A Garden of Birds: Attracting Birds to Australian Gardens. Angus & Robertson, p.195.