Cunnamulla bird life

The bird life in Cunnamulla is perfect for any beginner twitchers. On the road into town we saw an emu with his five chicks. Something I didn't know was that chick stealing is rife, with males trying to take over broods from other birds. While I didn't see it, a local told us of one male who currently has twenty chicks in his brood. Incredible thought! All those mouths to feed. I saw galahs and short billed corellas in large numbers - a flock of corellas must have numbered in the hundreds. We also saw the local gaggle of geese. This group lives down on the banks of the Warrego River, seeming right at home, evidently well loved (and fed) by locals. The birds that amazed me the most were the swallows. They nest at this time of year under the eaves of local buildings. While the local NAB has the most nests, it was those outside of the window of the Paroo Shire Council building that I was best able to observe. It really was a privilege to spy on these guys through the window. The nests are made of mud. Constructed in such a way that they cling to the eaves, with a bulge to hold eggs/babies, which then has a tube like entry point for the parent bird to squeeze in and out of to gain access to the nest. Made of mud the mind boggles at how many thousands of trips backwards and forwards the swallows must make with a mouthful of mud, to add to the construction. The nest ends up being sort of striped, and quite beautiful. I can only imagine this is because the source of the mud changes, or dries at a different rate. Actually I have no idea what causes the stripes, but I am in awe of these little birds. I know little about swallows, but do know that some are migratory travelling huge distances, so can only assume that these little guys fly half way around the world, then on arrival have to build their nest. What a mammoth effort! Postscript - since returning home I have perused my trusting Field guide to Australian birds, and am pleased to report that these little guys actually seem to be Martins, not Swallows....oops.

HistoryPin

Cunnamulla is a town full of history. As such it was easy to inspire library staff to appreciate the scope of what the UK based HistoryPin can do. With the core concept being as simple as loading photos (historic and contemporary) and "pinning" the geographic location, it really is pretty easy to use. Colleagues had posted some historic images from our SLQ collections. We then tried to match contemporary views of the same historic point of interest in Cunnamulla - and if the site was no longer recognisable added contemporary images of other points of interest instead. The old to new idea is fun and actually allows for a "fade in" overlay mechanism so that the years disappear before your eyes. Pretty neat really. We went on an afternoon excursion, everyone walking around town with their iPads at the ready to take photos and "pin" away. Much to the amusement of local townspeople. Even some of the local kids stopped to see what we were doing....the sight of the "oldies" using iPads was too good to pass up...."what you doing with iPads Miss?" So, tally for the afternoon was to capture contemporary views of the ambulance building, the Invincible Theatre and the Cunnamulla fountain as overlays of historic images. In addition we pinned the Paroo Shire Council building (funnily enough this appears on the main Cunnamulla post card), the now derelict Trappers Inn which is an historic hotel and the old RSL Cub. Currently for sale if anyone has disposable funds and wants to look at redeveloping the site. A solid brick building on a corner site it could again become a key destination in the community.

Cunnamulla

I have just spent the last week working from a base in the Paroo Shire Council Chambers in Cunnamulla. The Boardroom no less. What a great experience. Along with staff from the public library in Cunnamulla we also had staff from Wyandra, Yowah and Thargomindah join us. For those of you not too sure of where Cunnamulla is - imagine a 9 hour drive west of Brisbane and you would be close. Wyandra is an hour out of town on the Charleville road. As for Thargomindah? Irene had a four hour return trip each day to join us. How's that for dedication....plus she made it seem like it was just down the road - no trouble at all. Country people, and their outlook on life continue to amaze me. They really are inspiring. So, what did we do? Databases, OneSearch (the State Library) catalogue, eBooks, iPads, online resources, making your own eBooks and HistoryPin.....children's resources, story telling and craft activities, digital readers, research support and a whole swag of good stuff. It was interesting to see how the group embraced new ideas, and saw ways of connecting ideas back into practical ways for engaging with their community. Hopefully these images will give you a hint to what life in Cunnamulla is about - heat (local bar sign), humour (road sign) and highlights (detail of the Cunnamulla fountain).