The noisy miner (Manorina melanocephala) is a bird native to eastern and south-eastern Australia in the honeyeater family. It is grey with a black head, orange-yellow beak and feet, a distinctive yellow patch behind the eye and white tips on the tail feathers. Its almost constant vocalizations, particularly from young birds, include a large range of calls, scoldings and alarms. Primarily inhabiting dry, open eucalypt forests without understory shrubs, noisy miners are gregarious and territorial; they forage, bathe, roost, breed and defend territory communally, forming colonies of up to several hundred birds. Birds that live close to each other form stable associations called coteries. Temporary flocks are formed for activities such as mobbing a predator. The noisy miner is an aggressive bird, chasing, pecking, fighting, scolding, and mobbing both intruders and colony members throughout the day. The bird's numbers have increased significantly in many locations across its range, particularly in human-dominated habitats in which avian diversity has decreased.

Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noisy_miner

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1670:

A Royal Charter granted the Hudson's Bay Company a monopoly in the fur trade in Rupert's Land. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hudson%27s_Bay_Company

1757:

Konbaung forces captured the city of Bago, Burma, to end the Konbaung–Hanthawaddy War. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konbaung%E2%80%93Hanthawaddy_War

1945:

World War II: General Helmuth Weidling, commander of the German troops in Berlin, surrendered the city to Soviet forces led by Marshal Georgy Zhukov, ending the Battle of Berlin (Soviet soldiers pictured). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Berlin

1986:

Henri Toivonen was killed in an accident while leading the Tour de Corse rally, resulting in FISA banning the popular Group B rally cars for the following season. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_Toivonen

2011:

Osama bin Laden was shot and killed by U.S. Navy SEAL Team 6 in a private residential compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Osama_bin_Laden

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

mental gymnastics: 1. Difficult and complex logical thought processes. 2. (pejorative) Inventive, complex arguments used to justify unjustifiable decisions, or situations. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/mental_gymnastics

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

No explanation is required for Holy Writing. Whoso speaks truly is full of eternal life, and wonderfully related to genuine mysteries does his Writing appear to us, for it is a Concord from the Symphony of the Universe.   --Novalis https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Novalis