Is this a sparrow?

No it is a Kookaburra. Much much larger than a sparrow and it laughs. Native to Australia.

Hi Karen,
No this is not a sparrow it is a kookaburra (of the kingfisher family) native to Australia - not native to Western Australia, but were introduced many years ago. They are great hunters and eat small rodents, amphibians and snakes.

Good photo Kate.

Some years ago when I was laid up with a broken ankle I used to watch a kookaburra going to and fro from its nest. Then one day I saw it trying to fly into its nest but it kept missing the entrance by about 1/2 metre. Something must have gone wrong with its eyes. It tried and tried. Then flew away. More...

Small rodents, you say? I could use a kookaburra in my back yard!

For those who are interested, try -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kookaburra

Nice photo Kate.

Thanks, I have never seen one before this.

It's hard to judge its size from the picture, but that must be one confident bird to tackle rodents and snakes!

No wonder I didn't recognize it...it is native to Australia....

Oh, no...here comes the rain again...6:14 pm...there goes the local baseball game.

Me too Pat--it has poured down here all morning.

Fellow Puzzlers I have lied to you and I am so sorry. I told you that after July 5th, it generally doesn't rain again here until November. It seems I forgot it always rains on the Riesel parade when the fair comes to town. Sorry I did not intentionally mislead you.

I would like some of these birds. My cats are going to be working over time the next few weeks since the farmers are getting ready to plow. It seems that my inside/outside cat has lost her mind, she generally takes care of her potty bussiness outside, but since we brought the girl home, Busy (the More...

Thanks Kate, great photo. I see a family of Kookaburras when I go walking down by the Macquarie River. They are friendly and laugh a lot.

Yes that's my photo and I'm pretty sure I put a comment with it! It was sitting on top of my neighbour's clothes line & actually waited for me to run in & get my camera. After a few shots it 1/4 turned away from me but still sat for some more pictures! Thanks for the comments & thanks Ian & maureen for recognizing the kookaburra as mine.

Karen, I'm sorry but kookaburra's don't particularly like cats!!

Lovely photo, Kate. The foreground and subject are nicely focused and the background is slightly out of focus just to make it hard when broken into a jigsaw. Well done.

I think I'd put my money on the bird if it came to a catfight.

16/11/07 This makes six of my photos in the Archives.

12/31/07

Where is the bird? This is the (Jenni in Thailand, March, 2007) comment beneath the picture that is on this page that everyone is leaving comments on a bird. Good picture and puzzle. 02/27/08

Quite an impressive building.

There are so many of these older pictures turning up on the Sudoku site (January 2009) I suspect that the Kookaburra migrated from here to there to be replaced by Jenni.