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Back to Nature - Seeing in the Dark

by Jamie Walker



I have always loved the twilight, and darkness itself raises no concerns for me: only curiosity.


I remember, as a young man in the UK, coming out of a college’s evening class (we called it ‘night school’) in the City of Leicester. Despite traffic and other city sounds, from somewhere in the black sky far above the streetlights, I picked out the voices of migrating White-fronted Geese: and marvelled at how they did it.


We have such limited faculties ourselves. As it gets dark, our vision seriously diminishes, while the seeing ability of other creatures (not just owls and nocturnal mammals) continues to enable function and communication.


Ducks and geese have surprising night vision. Chestnut Teal are birds of saltwater. They prefer to feed on the rising tide and are never discouraged if that phase occurs at nighttime.  In places like Pumicestone Passage and Moreton Bay, you may see small flocks flighting low over the water, as the light is lost at sunset.


In other sunsets, when the tide is falling, little Striated Herons (no bigger than the Teal) emerge from the mangroves to creep in a sinister, hunched hunting pose across the exposed mud. They utilise frequent spells of total stillness so that their prey (mostly small crabs and fish) may not notice them. It is a competition, with all players using skills we can scarcely imagine.


In the daytime, warm air rising in thermals is a help to large-winged birds who wish to gain height and soar or travel. However, it can be a nuisance when they want to land. In the evening, this problem reduces as the atmosphere cools, but it may not totally disappear.


So, the Magpie Geese which came to the Maleny Wetlands at dusk, still had to rock in flight so that warm air under their wings would spill and enable their descent. This is a manoeuvre known as ‘whiffling’ and flying geese may sometimes turn aerobatically on to their backs, in order to achieve it.


I had stood still for a long time: my outline disguised by trackside casuarinas. But the geese were still cautious. They called quietly to one another in their honking voices, conspicuous in the stillness of the marshland, until – as if by a sudden unanimous judgement – they abandoned suspicion and dropped all at once, around where I stood.


A Nankeen Night Heron was just distinguishable as its dark shape flopped over the track, and my last sighting of the geese’s black and white feathers faded into the darkness.


The eyesight of all these creatures is immeasurably superior to our own. As I trained my low torch beam down onto the track to guide my departure, I heard the geese shift uneasily and murmur to each other. I could no longer see them, but I know they followed my every step as I left.


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