The Halstead Street, Eglinton, resident was on her way to school recently when she was swooped on by a magpie as she approached Griffith Showgrounds.

“I was riding my bike just normally and the magpie got on the back of my shirt,” Ellie said.

“I dropped my bike and ran for my life ... it just really scared me.”

Her next-door neighbour Leanne Ryan said with nobody home at her own house, a frightened Ellie ran to her home. 

“Ellie came back and she was as white as her shirt,” Miss Ryan said.

“She came to me because her mum wasn’t home. She was visibly shaken.”

Miss Ryan said Halstead and Cox streets, both dead-end streets, have laneways that lead to Griffith Showground, and many Eglinton Public School students take this short-cut to school.

Miss Ryan said her own daughter, Sarah, 9, often takes the same route to school as Ellie and has also been swooped by the territorial magpies.

“They’re the only two ways to get to school, other than the long way around,” she said.

Even when the young pair met the Western Advocate on site, a determined magpie made numerous swoops on Ellie and Sarah. 

Miss Ryan called on Bathurst Regional Council to erect signs warning people of the danger.

NSW National Parks and Wildlife ranger Steve Woodhall said magpie attacks are an annual occurrence by the dominate male bird with “too much testosterone”.

“He’s just on the hunt for anything that might be a danger ... every now and then they just get fixated on a particular area,” he said. “They’re not thinking rationally, they’ve just got testosterone running through them.”

Mr Woodhall said removing the offending magpie is rarely an option as another male will become dominant, kill the existing chicks, and the breeding process will start again.

“This is going to last for about six weeks until the chicks have fledged,” he said.

In response to Miss Ryan’s request, a Bathurst Regional Council spokesperson said they will assess the area at Eglinton and, if appropriate, put up warning signs.

“If residents let us know of a particular problem in a particular area we’ll certainly put signs up,” the spokesperson said.