A beautiful morning here with a family of emus currently strutting across the paddock.
We only saw two emus when we were in Oz, and that was only due to a sharp-eyed person spotting them in the distance. You couldn't even determine what they were without binoculars, they were that far away.
However we did see cassowaries in Queensland. There's a place called Cassowary House which they frequent and it was on our itinerary for the express purpose of seeing them. The tour leader had gone to visit the owner to arrange phone contact if the birds appeared, and meanwhile the rest of us were on a country lane a short distance away. Two or three of the men had gone a short way down a side road off the lane for a bush break when suddenly there was a disturbance where they were. Out of the road ran three young cassowaries, about a foot and a half tall, followed by the men whose bush break had been disturbed. I was about to berate them for chasing the birds when it became apparent that they were in fact fleeing in panic from the large male cassowary who emerged immediately behind them. Running away from a cassowary is about the worst thing you can do but the big male calmed down once he realized his offspring were safe.
Although many people believe the cassowary to be the most dangerous bird in Oz, our leader told us that that honour in fact belongs to the Australian magpie, which will freely attack people during the breeding season.
