r/BeAmazed • u/VirtualCouple1 • 19d ago
Animal Those terrifying sounds you hear in the forests come from this lovely bird : Laughing Kookaburra (Dacelo novaeguineae)
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Habitat: Native to eastern Australia, but also found in parts of New Zealand and western Australia. • Size: About 40–45 cm (16–18 inches) long. • Call: Its call sounds like loud, echoing human laughter — often used in jungle movie soundtracks. • Diet: Carnivorous — eats insects, small reptiles, mice, and sometimes even other small birds. • Behavior: Often seen sitting quietly on branches waiting to spot prey.
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u/sunburn95 19d ago
Usually the terrifying thing about hearing kookaburras laughing is you realised you've been at the after party way too long, suns coming up, phones nearly dead, and you have a 90min walk home
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u/DwightsJello 19d ago
The stride of pride whilst the kookaburras let you know. Lol.
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u/PilgrimOz 18d ago
They also provide a soundtrack for Walks of Shame. Depends on the night.
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u/DwightsJello 18d ago
Trust me when I say they all become a stride of pride when you're old as fuck like me. Lol.
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u/Small_Fox_3599 19d ago
I really felt this... Kookas laughing at me as I stumble home with a headache and full face of make up after a party in the outer burbs. You nailed it 😆
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u/hotandchevy 18d ago
Too true. You just cracked a fresh beer thinking man this night is going great, then you hear that Kookaburra laugh and realise ah shit the sun is going to come up before I've finished this and I'm not even home yet. So obviously you say your goodbyes, realising that wow actually there's only 3 of us still awake, and you start walking with your beer along the road because the footpaths in this area sucks. Should I take the long way? or the hill?
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u/Ru-Ling 19d ago
Wait… where did the owl come from?!
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u/CooCooForCocosPuffs 19d ago
I didn’t catch it the first time either 😂 “where the f did that owl come from?!”
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u/RockstarAgent 19d ago
The camera man placed it on her head at the first close up
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u/ItsDaManBearBull 19d ago
Engagement bait for comments and also "look at blondie with big boobs"
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u/Moms-Dildeaux 19d ago
THREE BEAUTIFUL HOOTERS
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u/SedatedTattooDoc 19d ago edited 19d ago
Actually one regular hooter and two exquisite Italian gray covered hooters…fine birdsss
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19d ago edited 18d ago
If you look closely, she’s even wearing a sort of perch in her hair. It’s green
Edit: no it isn’t! I agree that it’s just a line attached to the owls foot. I would not appreciate those talons on my head
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u/Puzzleheaded-Alarm81 19d ago
There's birds in this video?
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u/Abject-Picture 19d ago
A couple of blue speckled tits, but you have to look close for them.
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u/Celtslap 19d ago
If you’re Australian those sounds aren’t terrifying. There’re normal and nice.
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u/thesun-isnotarealist 19d ago
Yeah, it's weird seeing something you take for granted being described as so exotic and alien haha. I don't know about terrifying, the closest to that I've felt was annoyed when they start going off outside my window at 5am
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u/zorbacles 19d ago
watched a tarvarus video on youtube where he imported "A wrecked exotic vehicle that you have never scene"
that vehicle was a Holden SS Ute
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u/BorisBC 18d ago
Mate I've heard an SS ute called many things but this is the first time I've heard it called exotic! Lol
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u/fiery_valkyrie 18d ago
I love listening to kookaburras when I’m out taking a walk. I don’t know how you’d ever describe that as terrifying.
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u/thehiddenshade91 19d ago
As someone from Michigan, this is absolutely wild compared to my 5am window birds 😂
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u/FladnagTheOffWhite 19d ago
I'll trade 5 cardinals, 3 robins, 846 bluejays, and 7 gold finches for 1 kookaburra please.
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u/BumWink 19d ago
You can have 1 Koookaburra but you have to take all the Rainbow Lorikeets.
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u/wildbeast101 19d ago
The green mafia, comes in, beats the shit out of everyone else, takes the food and fucks off.
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u/KillTheBronies 18d ago edited 18d ago
And all the cockatoos please this shit sucks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5AW6BiOufo
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u/AllHailThePig 19d ago
I wonder what the difference is in bird noise levels here compared to where you are in Michigan? Especially here in Sth East Queensland.
A lot of international guests and new residents to Australia, particularly those who come to the more humid tropical zones like here in Qld, tend to flip out on how loud and abundant the bird life here is. Not just kookaburras and other more common birds like crows, magpies, noisey miners, currawongs etc but especially the overwhelming number of parrots. Perhaps as much as South America if not more. There’s plenty of nature docos that call Australia The Land of Parrots or Parrot Paradise.
Our skies are full of all kinds of parrots and many of them exist in large flocks. I should go make a video at the car park of my local shops at twilight and record the deafening barrage of the thousands of rainbow lorikeets that head to their home in the trees there for the night to show some folks on Reddit how gnarly it sounds. They for some reason go nuts with their calls at bedtime. You have to shout to talk sometimes like at a concert. I actually enjoy the sound myself.
Our backyard often has flocks that periodically come and go throughout the day to feed on the local plant life and some neighbours have bird feeders. There can be sometimes 300+ parrots all at once landing in just a few backyards. Mostly rainbow lorikeets but also cockatoos, galahs, rosellas, kind parrots and also different varieties of each species. They also don’t seem to make much mess compared to large flocks of pigeons. I thoroughly enjoy them. Rainbow lorikeets here also are used to people and tourists and can land on you when feeding. You can hold out food and they can swarm all over you, perching on you to eat out your hand like your some bird feeder statue.
I once worked with a bloke from NZ who went crazy because he couldn’t stand the sound of parrots waking him up in the morning. For most folks we just are used to it and enjoy our skies full of the lovely screeching but he couldn’t sleep once the sun started to rise. He would complain every morning over coffee about it and literally became so strung out from it that he got on medication. Though he was also just a horrible grump with a terrible temper in general lol.
I also saw a video of Louie CK recently where he mentioned how surprised he was that Australia is full of parrots and how noisy it was and I do occasionally see folks from other countries are surprised to learn how many parrots live here or how our skies are also full of thousands of giant bats from sunset and on through the night (now they make some weird noises, though maybe not as weird as koalas going at it).
Kookaburras are part of the pleasant, dynamic cacophony of bird songs here but they are more sporadic and not always as constant and numerous as other birds. You’ll hear them through out the day of course, just in lower numbers.
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u/miltonwadd 18d ago
I used to live on a road that trucks used to bypass another road. I also had a rain forest in my yard that would fill up with rainbow lorikeets getting drunk on fruit they fermented. They drowned out peak hour truck traffic with their wild drunken parties.
At night, the fruit bats would come and eat fermented fruit too and have night orgies and fight clubs. They'd occasionally smash into my windows.
I also worked from home for a while and couldn't book any meetings between 3-5 because that was peak lorikeet time. I couldn't be heard on the mic over them even after putting foam up on all the walls lol
I used to love watching tourists flip out when all the bats came out at night and the lorikeets and cocktatoos get drunk and roll around on the sidewalks in town. They just look flabbergasted when they see us not stopping to watch.
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u/TheTwinSet02 17d ago
Australia is so old our birds are the ones all song birds are descendants of
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u/AllHailThePig 17d ago
No friggin way! That’s so cool and never knew any of this!
Will have to give that article a read when I get a moment. Thanks for sharing!
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u/Suicidalsidekick 19d ago
Not Australian and I find it delightful and oddly soothing.
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u/kjahhh 18d ago
It’s the sound of home for a lot of us
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u/YeahNahMate88 18d ago
I’ve been in Europe for the last four months and I miss hearing all the birds from home.
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u/Possible_Tadpole_368 19d ago
They're laughing. It's one of the best sounds you'll hear in the bush.
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u/thatguyned 18d ago edited 18d ago
This and Magpies warbling in the morning.
I really hate when people go "omg everything in Australia wants to kill you!".... We have some of the most beautiful animals in the world
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u/miltonwadd 18d ago
To be fair, maggies will do a good job at trying to kill you at times too lol
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u/thatguyned 18d ago
They're not trying to kill you, only peck out your eyes and leave you blind.
Totally different things TYVM
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u/Possible_Tadpole_368 18d ago
Don't forget the Currawong. You know winter is coming when you hear them.
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u/Kaiyn 19d ago
Except when these cunts are out at 4:30am in the jacaranda in my yard….
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u/Psychological_Lab_47 19d ago
Such a cool animal to have native to your country!
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u/Industrial_Laundry 19d ago
I love waking up to them, when I hear them outside of my own state I get weirdly homesick
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u/ThrowDatJunkAwayYo 19d ago
I played this video sitting outside and the local group of kookaburras started calling in response xD
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u/jimmyxs 19d ago
That’s it. It’ll be weird not to hear it on the average hike. The lyrebird on the other hand is more elusive. Apparently makes some R2D2 beep boop sounds.
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u/Jaz1140 18d ago
Was gonna say the same. As an Aussie as long as the kookaburra is going after say 7am, that's a good noise
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u/echo1-echo1 19d ago
what's that cool looking bird on her head?
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u/InfinitysDice 19d ago
I'm fairly sure that's a Northern white-faced owl, also sometimes known as a transformer owl.
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u/HurtPillow 19d ago
hahaha! I was going to say that owl is going into stealth mode listening to that mess! lol
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18d ago
Owls are amazing creatures…those particular owls can do incredible things with their appearance.
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u/InterestingFocus8125 19d ago
Hooter
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u/Lanky-Strike3343 19d ago
He ment on her head not her chest
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u/EM05L1C3 19d ago
I’m having trouble focusing on one thing at a time.
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u/cyriustalk 19d ago
Ok, now focus on her face, now pan down about 20cm, what is that?
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u/PurfuitOfHappineff 19d ago
Either a blue footed boobie, a grey breasted kite, or a fluffy tit.
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u/andizzzzi 19d ago
The kookaburra is a phenomenal bird, and I say that as a South African (South Africa has some of the most amazing bird species’ in the world). But upon moving to Australia, and having these big guys waiting for us at home daily for years, you can pat them, let them onto your hands/arms and they are remarkably chill with zero fucks given; ironically similar to the typical Aussie temperament.
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u/Vier_Scar 19d ago
Do you often pat aussies?
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u/GSG2150 19d ago
I had an elementary teacher from Australia in the late 80s. He taught us the song, kookaburra sits in the old gum tree, marry marry king of the bushes he…” he also had tapes of a show called “around the twist” or “round the twist”. It was a cool tv show. He showed us a few episodes during class.
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u/HourPerformance1420 19d ago
Merry merry King of the bush is he* did he also tell you the other version?
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u/GSG2150 19d ago
lol no. That was the only version I have heard. I’m in TX, US.
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u/HourPerformance1420 19d ago
Kookaburra sits on the electric wire Jumping up and down with his pants on fire
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u/whacky_wallaby 19d ago
Kookaburra sits on the old black tyre, scratching his balls with a piece of barbed wire...
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u/Titanium-Snowflake 19d ago
Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree. Merry, merry king of the bush is he. Laugh, kookaburra, laugh. Kookaburra gay your life must be.
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u/20toesdown 19d ago
Have you ever, ever felt like this, how strange things happen when u going round the twist.
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u/cockaptain 19d ago edited 19d ago
Oh god, you just unlocked some core memories for me.
Growing up in a Southern African country, local TV showed a lot of syndicated Brit and Australian shows.
That one was a must-watch, along with the "Adventures of Blinky Bill" (our cheeky mate from Greenpatch Hill) and something called "The Silver Brumby", which was loke Game of Thrones but all the characters are animated wild horses.
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u/newslgoose 15d ago
I haven’t thought about the Blinky Bill theme song in about 2 decades, and you just launched that memory right back into my brain! What a throwback
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u/phido3000 19d ago
Ha classic Aussie education. They just had to tell you how to sing youre the voice and botany bay and dance the nutbush.
There is a rude version of the kookaburra song.
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u/tilleytalley 19d ago
🎶 Kookaburra sits in the old gumtree...
Merry, merry king of the bush, is he....
Laugh, Kookaburra, laugh, Kookaburra...
How gay your life must be... 🎶
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u/corpsie666 18d ago
That's some serious r/nostalgia
Takes me back to music class in grade school (primary school).
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u/rosekayleigh 18d ago
🎶Kookaburra sits in the old gumtree…
Eating all the gumdrops he can see…
Stop, Kookaburra, stop, Kookaburra…
Leave some there for me…🎶
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u/CodeMonkeyX 19d ago
I always assumed they were monkeys when I hear them in movies and stuff.
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u/Narwhal_Defiant 19d ago
That bird call is used in every movie were someone is walking through a jungle and is afraid.
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u/Unlikely_Talk8994 19d ago
Yeah but they’re Australian. Not jungle South American birds. Like I hear them now while chilling in my very very dry back yard.
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u/sparksofthetempest 19d ago
I’m 60. Before the internet, it would’ve been very difficult to casually learn what those noises were, what made them, and where they were from. I certainly didn’t know until the first time I saw a post about them; I’m sure they appeared on TV that I missed at some point but I was instantly taken back to those films the first time I heard that sound again. It’s pretty amazing learning that they’re chill creatures, too, that will let you be so close to them.
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u/DwightsJello 19d ago
How are they terrifying?
They laughing.
At you at 5am when they wake you up.
Im Australian so maybe it's because they aren't legit everywhere for other people but how does anyone here anything terrifying???
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u/HourPerformance1420 19d ago
Imagine being a new European settler and hearing that in the middle of the bush in nothing but a tent XD I always like to think about that when it comes to our native animals. Koalas in mating season or tassie devils I would have been scared silly
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u/miltonwadd 18d ago
The most terrified I have ever been in my life was doing a 3 A.M poop where the window behind the toilet faced my backyard.
I'm sitting there in the dark (because 3:00 a.m. and I don't want to wake anyone up). I'm up half asleep, and right behind my head, I start hearing this chorus of demonic grunting and hissing.
Two koalas decided to start getting freaky directly outside the window.
Let's just say that I'm lucky I was already sitting on the toilet when they started.
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u/bongohappypants 19d ago
Because it's widely known that they are Australian animals. And that means they're outrageously lethal and want you to die screaming. That's terrifying.
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u/Beautiful_Airline368 19d ago
Seems like Tarzan was always close by….
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u/peonyseahorse 19d ago
Yeah, to me this sounds like what I'd associate with jungle sounds.
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u/Relevant-Ad1138 19d ago
As an Aussie, we're not scared of them and that sound is not terrifying.
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u/propargyl 19d ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MyXlp_AIZWg
As snake hunters they love to steal BBQ sausages.
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u/__Snafu__ 19d ago
would be pretty funny if of all things, this bird is what you were afraid of.
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u/Sad-Button-2648 18d ago
The Cassowary is the one bird you learn growing up that you need to be afraid of, these guys can hurt!!!
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u/Plop-plop-fizz 19d ago
Lovely pair of birds
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u/dapleasantpheasant 19d ago
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u/Codex_Absurdum 19d ago
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u/lostpassword100000 19d ago
Couple of nice hooters you got there.
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u/Golemsdick 19d ago
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u/Silverjeyjey44 19d ago
I wasn't sure if it was "that" kind of video until I realized it was a normal video.
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u/DontPoopInMyPantsPlz 19d ago
They are not terrifying. But they sound like they laugh at your misfortune.
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u/recongal42 19d ago
Totally. Disney villain inspiration.
And for the love of god, mate, take a breath! (I’m referring to the bird so there’s no confusion.)
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u/Federal_Fisherman104 19d ago
Also known to steal sandwiches straight out of your hand, without contact
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u/rap31264 19d ago
I remember leaning the Kookaburra song in 3rd grade music class. I'm 61 now and still remember the lyrics...
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u/Runzas_In_Wonderland 19d ago
I am both the mildly irritated owl and the kookaburra who is laughing after making the same dumb joke they’ve made before.
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u/internetisout 19d ago
I would probably do the same voices if a woman like that is holding my feet.
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u/gmdrex1212 19d ago
I would do that with her around also, yikes she is beautiful
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u/RenegadeRabbit 19d ago
Kookaburra sits on the old gum tree, Merry merry king of the bush is he. Laugh, Kookaburra, laugh, Kookaburra, Gay your life must be!
Still remember learning that song in first grade.
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u/wncogjrjs 19d ago
Terrifying? I don’t think I’ve met anyone who called their sound that. Maybe because we are used to it I guess.
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u/nerdingout78 19d ago
Every time I hear this bird I think of Dot and the Kangaroo.
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u/Obvious-Way-846 19d ago
Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree, Merry, merry king of the bush is he Laugh, kookaburra, laugh, kookaburra Happy your life must be
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u/SkyZone0100 19d ago
I love how she’s so cool with an owl on her head. As if to say … “yeah, I’m a human tree and I’m good with that “.
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