Return of the Backyard Cockatoos

I was typing on the computer today when I heard a loud commotion outside from none other then once again from my friends the cockatoos:

These cockatoos have been driving nuts lately because they have been tearing apart the big gum tree in my backyard.  When I go outside to rake up the mess the cockatoos literally sit up in the tree and fling branches at me.  This is an unusual behavior from these extremely smart birds that I haven’t seen before.

Anyway now there was just one cockatoo waddling around my backyard and making a tremendous amount of noise:

I soon found out why because he was calling out to his friends that it was clear to join him:

I had a park ranger tell me that cockatoos will often send one cockatoo forward to scout out an area to make sure it is safe and then it will yell back to his buddies that the coast is clear for them to join him.  And join him they did as my backyard was quickly filled with cockatoos:

These cockatoos don’t eat the grass but actually pull out the roots of the grass and nibble on them while also looking for worms.  The park ranger had also told me that while cockatoos are grazing somewhere they tend to keep a lookout in one of the trees to look for any predators.  So often cockatoos appear to take off in unison for no reason and that is because there look out warns them of something that it sees coming towards them such as maybe a big eagle or a dog.

As much as I like cockatoos, the way they are destroying my backyard makes me think that maybe it is time to get a dog.