Peacock sail

This is what happens when you try to be too much of a show off in a high wind. You get the Marilyn Monroe skirt flip without being sexy. It is, however, rather amusing.

Do you have enough for everybody?

Gem has his dinner stolen by the free range sheep regularly. He often leaves it to investigate what the other horses are having (the same) and returns to find one of the mares eating his too. Sometimes one of the wethers reaches through the fence for a mouthful. He just shakes his head at it, which is horse for "Garrrn, get out if it!" The most angry he'll get is to shake a snaky head at a wayward lamb, ears pinned back as he pretends to snap at them. Then it's back to munching his mixture. Tonight however, even one of the peacocks had a go.

I thought this might be the last straw for Gem, but instead he just looked sideways at me, flicked some of the mix out of his bowl with his muzzle as if searching for tastier bits at the bottom and continued to eat. The peacock gratefully pecked at the flicked bits. I'm sure I heard Gem thinking "Here," flick, flick, "Now leave me alone!"

Shake your tailfeather

Trying to find something feathered and female to display to means the peacock-in-unauthorised-residence is sometimes reduced to putting on a show for a captive audience. The lawn in front of the henhouse makes a good stage and he's got room to turn around there doing the seductive dance of the feathered fan.


He never seems to display to the hens when they are freeranging. Perhaps hens out on the town in a group scare him (they seem to scare most blokes). The presence of Silver Boy, the aggressive Araucana rooster may or may not have something to do with his sudden shyness when meeting hens in a more informal setting but whilst the hens are confined to quarters he's all dazzle and confidence.


Silver Boy may not be impressed but whilst the peacock is showing all his eyes all other eyes are on him. The hens all crowd forward to the viewing area making appreciative cooing noises or suggestive cluck cluck clucks and watch for the duration whilst Silver Boy hovers behind hissing at them to be ladylike and behave.

Peacock parade

Lately, when getting up in the morning to face the day from the main entrance to the house, we are greeted by this.


It's not an explosion in an orchid bed or a solidified fireworks display or even the beginnings of an exotic dance. Rather it's this fella, the peacock-we-don't-officially-like-but-will-tolerate, fluffing up for the day.

It takes him some time to limber up because it's quite an effort to walk around, as a peacock at this time of year and in want of a wife must, like this:

Its such an effort. He tries so hard. I'm flattered he's displaying to me and just can't help but to be impressed. Pity I'm entirely the wrong species.

Pea-cocktails

The peacocks-that-we-don't-like-very-much lost their tails gradually at the end of autumn. Mostly on our verandah, but one unfortunate chap seemed to lose all his in one night in the orchard. We found most of it the next day. He may have been grabbed by a fox who found itself left with a mouthful of untasty stuff and left it. Effective escape strategy, that.


The lost feathers made an ornamental bouquet in an old stone jar, but not inside the house! Peacock feathers are apparently bad luck when brought inside the house. This is my grandmother's wisdom and she Knew Things. I'm not going to risk it.


Slowly their tails have been growing longer, then developing iridescent "eyes" that move down the length of the tail from the base to the tip as they grow. One strutting gentleman seems to have been seized by the tail at some point as he's missing some off the left side of it.


For a while the peacocks didn't have to do their skirt-flipping move to turn around in tight spaces. This involves holding their tail up over their backs at an awkward angle and pirouetting on one foot at the same time to turn around on a narrow path. Or when startled in the garden. Or when inspecting the shed they are not allowed into.


Their necks are always blue. Peacock blue, strangely enough. Their tails change constantly in the light. Sometimes they're green. Sometimes they're bronze. Sometimes they're almost rose pink.


As their tails get longer and longer the peacocks learn to cope. Like kindly moving them aside for me as I make my way to my own front door. Such nice peacocks, only eating about three quarters of the seedlings and generously leaving us some. They're quite used to us now, despite not being welcome. We tell them this. They ignore us. They like it here.

Pesky peacocks

Our nearest neighbours are lovely people with a larger place than ours and a menagerie of their own. Parts of their farm have very high fences and a  fox proof electric-fenced enclosure they call "the sanctuary" so their numerous tame animals stay on their place. Well mostly. Sometimes sheep explore out on the road, the last time was a ewe and lamb just moseying along the verge. At one stage their Saanen goat went for a wander, as goats will, and the odd dog gets out. A couple of times cows have jumped the fence into our place, and numerous times onto the road. I've been coming home from work several evenings to find bovine road blocks just standing, thinking, quite unperturbed by large metal objects on wheels hurtling towards them. There's one of their cows in another neighbour's place just now.

So all right, the neighbours' animals don't always stay in their place. Most of them go back where they belong without too much protest however, and rarely do we get repeat performances from the same animal. Except for the peacocks.

Along with the more traditional feathered farm species the neighbours also keep peacocks. Except that when a peacock perches on a high electric fence the current isn't grounded by its feet like other animals, so it's a painlessly short leap to the other side. This way they feel no shock, and no prick of conscience either. The world is their oyster. And feed bowl. So the neighbours don't really keep them as such, just feed them occasionally when the peacocks drop home to say Hi, pick up their laundry and raid the fridge. Other than that they're always out. Party peacocks.

The peacocks just have a different map in their head of their territory which doesn't end at the boundary fence and our place is a favoured part of that map. Rapid natural selection by foxes (they selected the slow ones) has meant that there are now only two of the original four left but this may be a good thing. Those two get about. They're a bit more street wise too, roosting high in our gum trees out of the reach of marauders.

You may think it's lovely to see the splendid plumage in the roses, to see the dappled light on the metallic green, to catch a glimpse of the irridescent blue in the shrubbery and you'd be right. They are lovely, walking with a dignified strut up the driveway, laying in the sun glistening bronze, perching on the henhouse and harrassing the chickens.

They are quite beautiful whilst they madly attack their reflection in living room windows for hours on end, pecking violently at the glass and slashing the flyscreens with their claws. They are enchanting as they eat every baby lettuce seedling we plant and any strawberries the lizards missed. They are charming whilst they strip the peach tree sapling of all its leaves and eat all the cherry tomatoes. They are utterly delightful draped over the veranda railing, leaving rather large, squishy calling cards on all our main walkways. We just adore them. Really.