Bin chickens: the grotesque glory of the urban ibis – in pictures
Tip turkey, dumpster chook, rubbish raptor – the Australian white ibis goes by many unflattering names. But it is a true urban success story, scavenging to survive in cities across Australia as wetlands have been lost. Wildlife photographer Rick Stevens captured them in Sydney
- See the rest of our Australian cities week series here
-
The white ibis is common across northern and eastern Australia, and growing in number in western Australia. All photographs: Rick Stevens
-
That its range has increased even as its natural habitat has declined is testament to the ibis’ impressive adaptability
-
There are up to 9,000 ibises in the Sydney region – twice as many as in Australia’s inland wetlands
-
Of all the species affected by river regulation in Australia, the ibis is one of the few that has changed its behaviour and moved to coastal cities
-
-
Even as ibis numbers decline in some areas, the birds are colonising others as they adjust to urban living – and the associated fast-food diet
-
Today ibises are more often seen wading through landfills than waterside vegetation, with their diet expanding to include scrap and refuse (and human vomit) along with worms, fish and frogs
-
Their indiscriminate scavenging – combined with their prevalence – has inspired a number of nicknames, most commonly ‘bin chicken’ or ‘tip turkey’
-
Though it is a native species, the ibis is so prevalent in Australian cities that it is often considered a pest
-
-
Populations near some tourist attractions in Sydney have been culled due to their smell and pestering of picnickers
-
Last month authorities in Perth ordered a cull of 100 of the ‘pest birds’ that they said posed a risk to planes and passengers
-
They have often been known to snatch food from people’s hands
-
Concerns that ibises carry disease are said by experts to be misplaced, but that has done little to ease widespread dislike of the species
-
-
To some, however, the ibis has earned a cult-hero status with its bald-faced, brazen will to survive, epitomising the spirit of the ‘Aussie battler’
-
‘It’s the very things that disgust passersby that enable ibis to survive against seemingly insurmountable odds in cities,’ wrote one fan in 2015
-
The ibis was the unlikely runner-up in Guardian Australia’s bird of the year competition last year following the #TeamBinChicken social media campaign
-
Ecologist Dr John Martin said it was a ‘great moment’, reflecting the Australian sense of humour: ‘Voting the bin chicken as our runner-up bird of the year is a bloody classic’
-
-
‘Vote the ibis,’ tweeted one fan, ‘an elegant bird, a great survivor, displaced by humans only to turn out to be better at city life than we are’
View all comments >
This discussion is closed for comments.
I think they are beautiful. I'll trade for these guys (is the plural "ibises?") any day. I'm bored with our run of the mill seagulls here, also known as "rats with wings."
In a way, isn't this ironic justice? We stole their wetlands, and instead of quietly disappearing into extinction, they turned around and said, "No, f--- you!" and found a successful niche in exposing us humans as wasteful consumers. Well played, sirs!
Perhaps they are evolving and have discovered that cities offer a greater degree of amenity and a better cultural life than your average swamp!
As highlighted in a nice ABC piece on the bird, their presence sends a rather straightforward and pointed message: "I am here because my home environment is no longer adequate for my needs".
How poignant and shameful then that so many choose to resent this 'bearer of bad news'.
Wow
Someone else appreciates these unfairly maligned birds
For those who don't seeing them in their black satin in early spring is a revelation.
And we should wonder at the survival and thriving of such, and the corellas and crows, my personal favourite.
So they tend to leave a bit of a mess here and ere.
Small price to pay for beauty and a reminder that we are custodians for something remarkable
To say nothing of their scientific value - appare…
Wow
Someone else appreciates these unfairly maligned birds
For those who don't seeing them in their black satin in early spring is a revelation.
And we should wonder at the survival and thriving of such, and the corellas and crows, my personal favourite.
So they tend to leave a bit of a mess here and ere.
Small price to pay for beauty and a reminder that we are custodians for something remarkable
To say nothing of their scientific value - apparently they're rather similar in hair, or so it's thought, to bipedal dinosaurs.
And if this post seems disjointed and odd and somewhat hagiographic no worries as I'm currently listening to the wail of a bush stone curlew
Australia isn't about flames and anthems and public holidays. It's about maintaining our connection with an ancient and very special land at, in the words of Paul Keating, the arse end of the world.
Whoops
I should have mention ed the privilege of watching sunbirds nest on Thursday Island
And cormorants in the trees at noosa
And th.e cockatoo that screeched over a cemetery at the funeral of a dear friend
And scrub turkeys harassing suburban gardeners
To say nothing of black cockatoos and king parrots that have made one particular golf course their home
And the drunken frolics of lorikeets in the umbrella trees next to my home
And ........
I could go on and on and probably have
We leave the mess - they take advantage of it. Amazingly elegant bird. Should never be seen near a rubbish bin.
Hi rumple
Nicely put
Cheers
They do help clear up the mess round the fish market. And I much prefer them to the screechy, aggressive gulls!
Seagulls are also beautifully elegant. They're stunning. The Ibis is just a big version of it akin to Australia's size.
Just as the Kangaroo is like the British fix or something.
Just a thought
Could we have a similar article on brushtail possums
Opportunistically agressive to some
Night stalkers of the first order to others
Including me
I feed them my carrot peels, they love them.
For truly serious numbers of these birds, visit an active tip face at your local rubbish dump.
Here in Italy, we have the North African sacred ibis as a summer visitor (the one that figures in Egyptian carvings). I have seen them in a wetland area near Florence.
Perhaps they are evolving and have discovered that cities offer a greater degree of amenity and a better cultural life than your average swamp!
As highlighted in a nice ABC piece on the bird, their presence sends a rather straightforward and pointed message: "I am here because my home environment is no longer adequate for my needs".
How poignant and shameful then that so many choose to resent this 'bearer of bad news'.
There are other animals we have ruined because we made them into rats, hardly fair to the animals
A 'harbinger' if you will
I think they are beautiful. I'll trade for these guys (is the plural "ibises?") any day. I'm bored with our run of the mill seagulls here, also known as "rats with wings."
In a way, isn't this ironic justice? We stole their wetlands, and instead of quietly disappearing into extinction, they turned around and said, "No, f--- you!" and found a successful niche in exposing us humans as wasteful consumers. Well played, sirs!
I love photographing ibis, and not just because they are easy to capture in flight. They are such regal and prehistoric-looking birds.
Saying the wetlands have been 'lost' makes it sound like they were carelessly misplaced.
No. Much worse than carelessly misplaced. Deliberately destroyed by greedy human “developers.” The quotation marks indicate that those people don’t develop anything, but they do destroy all that was once wonderful about our country, including wetlands.
What a weird coincidence - 'dumpster chook' is my girlfriend's pet name for me...
Plight of the homeless... life in the Anthropocene.
I took pictures last week of a flock of seagulls (not the musical group) making their living in Barstow, California, a meth-lab desert hellhole of the highest order. They all looked profoundly dejected.
The perfect beak for piercing a bin liner. Could that weapon even open an oyster? I wouldn't bet against it. Do they screech like peacocks or gobble like turkeys?
Onya Gordon!
Why "grotesque"? They look rather noble to me.
Ibises are one of the extremely few native animals that can safely consume cane toads. I see them down at my local duck pond eating them by the truckload. So not only have they survived the human onslaught, they've contained one of the greatest ecological disasters that humans have foisted on this continent. Magnificent bird, indeed.
I could rewrite every caption to be far more accurate. E.g.
Populations near some tourist attractions in Sydney have been culled due to their smell and pestering of picnickers
Populations of humans near all wild areas in Australia should have been culled due to their smell and decimation of native wildlife
Lol Bin Chickens
Nature finds another use for humans. We don't have many, so good luck to the Ibises.
I worry about radicalised seagulls joining Ibis.
We have fully wild ibis at our place in South Gippsland. They are naturally quite timid and usually keep at least 50 metres away. In summer they work the edge of the wetland for frogs, lizards and bugs and in winter they move to the flooded paddocks.
I was recently told, an Ibis had been seen to pick up a cane toad, and then wash it before eating it.
Gosh, I wish we had some in the Philippines - mind you they'd all be eaten in a day or two, lol