Bristol to Kagu ? (1 Viewer)

[Larry Sweetland]

Cheers H, yes we did meet up for a much needed dip indeed. Worth going to Gunlom just for that amazing pool to cool off in after dipping. Little shrimps come and clean your feet too.

And cheers Tony, not long till hols now mate. GPS means global positioning system, the latest weapon in the birding cyborg's arsenal. Efficient birding now appears to be all about the equation :

USD + 4 x 4 + GPS + MP3 = OML

No luck yesterday scanning solidly for 3 hours up till nearly dusk at Bayview bvd for Chestnut Rail. Tide got just too high before sun below horizon, so we relocated to the access point along Tiger Brennan Drive, where again no luck but I think I heard them. At dawn this morning tide was too high and rising at Bayview, so I spent the first couple of hours of daylight in the mangroves at Tiger Brennan. No rails. No crocodiles. Did see the first Mangrove Robins of the trip, Yellow White-eye, Common Sandpiper etc. Unfortunately, single-mindedly scanning for rails has probably contributed to the fact that we haven't encountered some birds yet that I recall were quite common round Darwin, eg Mangrove Grey Fantail, Mangrove Golden Whistler, Brown Whistler, Rainbow Pitta and Green-backed Gerygone. These would all be trippers.

Back at Leprechaun campsite a Channel-billed Cuckoo flew over during breakfast.

We're leaving Darwin tomorrow, so tonight and dawn will be our last chance for Chestnut Rail. We're going to stay at Lee Point camp ground. If there are any Aussie birders out there who happen to be going to Buffallo Creek boat ramp tonight or tomorrow morning with an MP3 then I won't complain one bit.

1420 Mangrove Robin

 

[Mike Jarvis]

All the best with finding the Chestnut Rail Larry. Would love to come down and meet you there tomorrow morning but can't get away. I've seen Brown (Grey) Whistler and Rainbow Pitta in the bushes between the first section of carpark and the beach at Buffalo Creek, would be a pity not to see the Pitta.

 

[chowchilla]

USD + 4 x 4 + GPS + MP3 = OML

My brain hurts...

As for the mangrove specialities; we have another good chance for said passerines (though prob. not the Rail... :-C ) at Broome. Mind you, I have about two nanoseconds in the Darwin area en route to WA to try and get the Pitta and I think Brown Whistler amongst others.

Two more days of work...

 

[birdboybowley]

Pitta was a piece of p*ss at Howard Springs

 

[chowchilla]

Pitta was a piece of p*ss at Howard Springs

I re-read that bit of your report and considered either there or East Point for an early morning walk. I'll have to get a taxi there mind...

 

[birdboybowley]

Hey Chowie,

Saw the pitta at both those sites, but it was far easier at Howard Springs...early am or later pm and it was there each and every time I visited on along the start of the trail off to the left of the car-park. Gorgeous bird!

 

[Wompoo Dove]

Thanks for all that gen H, you're a diamond And yes, I do need Princess Parrot of course, unless I can count the one in a cage at Curtain Springs Roadhouse?

Hi Larry:

There have been some great sightings of Princess lately that have been reported on the Birding-aus site. One hot off the press within the last 48 hours!

I am still excited about spending 5 days in this species habitat in Western Aus last September 2008 and seeing 2 different flocks on 2 different days! If anyone cares to learn about it and see images from video taken of the flock they are welcome to do so here:

http://polytelismedia.wordpress.com/2008/09/

You can even survey the "roo damage" that my faithful mate Chowchilla and I endured with the rental car on our trip to Georgetown on the same page...

Cheers!

Don

 

[Larry Sweetland]

Into WA

Shame I didn't catch you Mike, but hopefully I'll be back to the Top End one day, for those pesky grasswrens and rails! We failed to score with Chestnut Rail morning or evenig at Buffalo Creek, though we did hear them annoyingly close. Very busy with people at dawn and dusk. Spent a total of more than 10 hours while in Darwin looking for a bird that most birders see with a tape in 5 minutes. As Nicky observed, we've spent 2 days of our holiday watching mud. I'm through being a neanderthal. Next time I'm in top end it's with a huge speaker stack pumpin' rail choonz.

Wompoo, I'm not sure that Basil (our car) would appreciate us trying to take it anywhere near the Princess Parrots, or is this recent sighting miraculously from tarmac?

Before leaving Darwin we popped into East Point atduring the heat of the day, and even then saw a couple of Brown Whistlers on the dry forest walking trail.

Before heading westward from Katherine we detoured 51km further south down the Stuart Highway and birded the forest aroun 8km up the Central Arnhem Road. Northern Shrike-Tit has been seen here, as has another bird mostly not currently classified as a full species by most people currently classified as taxonomists, Golden-backed Honeyeater. We failed to find the former, which is worryingly rare, but did see 4 Golden-backed Honeyeaters, as well as Tawny Frogmouth, Pallid Cuckoo, Brown Quail, Black-tailed Treecreeper etc. A local aboriginal bloke we met at the site said that fire swept through the area only a few months ago. We also spent half an hour or so exploring dry forest to the west of Chainman Creek, c25km SW of Katherine, where Northern Shrike-Tit has also been reported. Again this area appeared to have been burnt recently.

Night before last we made it to Victoria River Roadhouse, where Purple-crowned Fairy-Wrens are common in the riverside grasslands. We found them easy to hear but some effort to see. My target bird in this area was White-quilled Rock-Pigeon, and we eventually found 2 of them after walking around at the top of the escarpment walk in the evening. The walk starts from a layby 2km west of the roadhouse. If you like your White-quilled Rock-Pigeons to have white quills, then you shouldn't bother with the subspecies at this site. Potential split?

So we then crossed into WA just after lunch time yesterday and spent the night at the free camping area 12km past Kununurra. WA's treated us well so far birdwise.We saw a smart white-quilled White-quilled Rock-Pigeon on a short evening walk around the Mirima "mini Bungle Bungles" on the north edge of town, and found an active Great Bowerbird bower there.

This morning we saw 30+ Star Finches and better still 3+ Yellow-rumped Mannikins at the 3rd irrigation channel crossing down Ivanhoe road. To get to this spot head west out of Kununurra, and just past the lake take the road on the right signed Ivanhoe Rd. It's c5.5km to the 3rd irrigation channel. This morning most of the finches (also including Crimson, Double-barred and Chestnut-breasted Mannikin) were within 100m west of the road on the south side of the channel. Yesterday afternoon we found them a few hundred metres west of the road on the north side. Yellow-rumped Mannikin's half a tick for me as the only one i'd seen previously was a hybrid near Darwin many years ago.

This morning at the parkup I noticed soeone was looking at birds with bins, so I went and chatted to him. He's just given me a site where he saw a pretty good bird yesterday, so we're off to try and see them this avo! How exciting.

1421 CHESTNUT RAIL
1422 Brown Whistler
1423 Golden-backed Honeyeater
1424 WHITE-QUILLED ROCK-PIGEON
1425 YeLlOw-RuMpEd MaNnIkIn

More pics from Nicky: 1 Barking Owl
2 Long-tailed Finch
3 Looking for WQ Rock-Pigeons

 

[chowchilla]

Hi Larry:

There have been some great sightings of Princess lately that have been reported on the Birding-aus site. One hot off the press within the last 48 hours!

I am still excited about spending 5 days in this species habitat in Western Aus last September 2008 and seeing 2 different flocks on 2 different days! If anyone cares to learn about it and see images from video taken of the flock they are welcome to do so here:

http://polytelismedia.wordpress.com/2008/09/

You can even survey the "roo damage" that my faithful mate Chowchilla and I endured with the rental car on our trip to Georgetown on the same page...

Cheers!

Don

How're you doing Don? I'm off to WA in a few days and meeting up and travelling with Larry and Nicky for a wee while. Can't wait!

 

[chowchilla]

Shame I didn't catch you Mike, but hopefully I'll be back to the Top End one day, for those pesky grasswrens and rails! We failed to score with Chestnut Rail morning or evenig at Buffalo Creek, though we did hear them annoyingly close. Very busy with people at dawn and dusk. Spent a total of more than 10 hours while in Darwin looking for a bird that most birders see with a tape in 5 minutes. As Nicky observed, we've spent 2 days of our holiday watching mud. I'm through being a neanderthal. Next time I'm in top end it's with a huge speaker stack pumpin' rail choonz.

Wompoo, I'm not sure that Basil (our car) would appreciate us trying to take it anywhere near the Princess Parrots, or is this recent sighting miraculously from tarmac?

Before leaving Darwin we popped into East Point atduring the heat of the day, and even then saw a couple of Brown Whistlers on the dry forest walking trail.

Before heading westward from Katherine we detoured 51km further south down the Stuart Highway and birded the forest aroun 8km up the Central Arnhem Road. Northern Shrike-Tit has been seen here, as has another bird mostly not currently classified as a full species by most people currently classified as taxonomists, Golden-backed Honeyeater. We failed to find the former, which is worryingly rare, but did see 4 Golden-backed Honeyeaters, as well as Tawny Frogmouth, Pallid Cuckoo, Brown Quail, Black-tailed Treecreeper etc. A local aboriginal bloke we met at the site said that fire swept through the area only a few months ago. We also spent half an hour or so exploring dry forest to the west of Chainman Creek, c25km SW of Katherine, where Northern Shrike-Tit has also been reported. Again this area appeared to have been burnt recently.

Night before last we made it to Victoria River Roadhouse, where Purple-crowned Fairy-Wrens are common in the riverside grasslands. We found them easy to hear but some effort to see. My target bird in this area was White-quilled Rock-Pigeon, and we eventually found 2 of them after walking around at the top of the escarpment walk in the evening. The walk starts from a layby 2km west of the roadhouse. If you like your White-quilled Rock-Pigeons to have white quills, then you shouldn't bother with the subspecies at this site. Potential split?

So we then crossed into WA just after lunch time yesterday and spent the night at the free camping area 12km past Kununurra. WA's treated us well so far birdwise.We saw a smart white-quilled White-quilled Rock-Pigeon on a short evening walk around the Mirima "mini Bungle Bungles" on the north edge of town, and found an active Great Bowerbird bower there.

This morning we saw 30+ Star Finches and better still 3+ Yellow-rumped Mannikins at the 3rd irrigation channel crossing down Ivanhoe road. To get to this spot head west out of Kununurra, and just past the lake take the road on the right signed Ivanhoe Rd. It's c5.5km to the 3rd irrigation channel. This morning most of the finches (also including Crimson, Double-barred and Chestnut-breasted Mannikin) were within 100m west of the road on the south side of the channel. Yesterday afternoon we found them a few hundred metres west of the road on the north side. Yellow-rumped Mannikin's half a tick for me as the only one i'd seen previously was a hybrid near Darwin many years ago.

This morning at the parkup I noticed soeone was looking at birds with bins, so I went and chatted to him. He's just given me a site where he saw a pretty good bird yesterday, so we're off to try and see them this avo! How exciting.

1421 CHESTNUT RAIL
1422 Brown Whistler
1423 Golden-backed Honeyeater
1424 WHITE-QUILLED ROCK-PIGEON
1425 YeLlOw-RuMpEd MaNnIkIn

More pics from Nicky: 1 Barking Owl
2 Long-tailed Finch
3 Looking for WQ Rock-Pigeons

I can't believe how fast you folks are moving. In WA already! You'll beat me to Broome at this rate...

How comes YRM is only half a tick? Maybe I've misread your post...:h?:

Love the pic of the Barking Owl btw.:t:

 

[Allen S. Moore]

I can't believe how fast you folks are moving. In WA already! You'll beat me to Broome at this rate...

How comes YRM is only half a tick? Maybe I've misread your post.

No, it looked the same from here, too!

 

[Mark Harper]

If hybrids are half a tick, does that mean if you see a second hybrid two halves make a whole tick? I will be looking for Black-eared Miners amongst the Yellow-throated hybrids later this year, might have to keep a list of fractions of Miners until I have seen enough to add to a whole one.

 

[Wompoo Dove]

Hows it going mate?

How're you doing Don? I'm off to WA in a few days and meeting up and travelling with Larry and Nicky for a wee while. Can't wait!

Tony that should be fantastic... guess you got some time off work to go roaring around some more! I guess Larry and Nicky just cant stay away from Aus ....|=)|

Still working on the film here... currently working on Musk Lorikeets. So fun to review the footage as it takes me back to the habitat and such a treat to watch the little characters scrambling through the gum trees rapidly grabbing nectar/pollen from the Euc flowers.

www.polytelismedia.wordpress.com

Have a fantastic trip!

Cheers!

Don

 

[Wompoo Dove]

Wompoo, I'm not sure that Basil (our car) would appreciate us trying to take it anywhere near the Princess Parrots, or is this recent sighting miraculously from tarmac?

Hi Larry:

There is no question that your car would not only not appreciate the Princess Parrot road but find it pretty much impossible to traverse this area in a 2 wheel drive. I sure wouldnt attempt it!

By the way I wasnt sure during your travels if you got to see Scarlet-chested Parrot. This was another beauty I was so fortunate to see when I was in aus. I followed up on a 10 year old report (I didnt know the report was that stale at the time) and bingo! Found 2 brilliantly colored males in a remote desert area.

If you or anyone wants to have a look at more details of the SCP adventure you can take a look on my blog.

http://polytelismedia.wordpress.com/2009/01/

Cheers and happy birding!

Don Kimball

 

[Larry Sweetland]

On to Broome

I think Mark's post should clarify for those confused about the half tick. You could have some fun there Mark. If you see anything with any Black-eared Miner features at all, you'll have seen more of one than us! Better get in there quick if you want a pure one methinks.

One spot I was very much hoping to get to around Kununurra was Marglu Billabong, also called Parry's Lagoon, mostly because there are often Yellow Chats there. On meeting Rest Stop Bill, he told us he'd just spent 2 days there, and there were about a dozen Yellow Chats there, mostly at the edge of the billabong, c400m to the right of the hide. To get there take the road up towards Wyndham, and turnoff to the right about 3/4 of the way to Wyndham onto the signed dirt road. It's about 8km of rough dirt track.

We spent an afternoon here, then camped by the billabong and birded around it again in the morning. We had the place to ourselves. Well, us and the crocs and dingos. And of course the birds. We saw about 80 species in or around the small billabong during our stay, including Star and Masked Finches, Pictorella and Yellow-rumped Mannikins, a multitude of ibises, spoonbills, ducks, geese, herons, egrets, waders, darters, grebes, swamphens, parrots, cockatoos, raptors, pigeons, quail, passerines galore and whatnot. What I could not find for the life of me though I thrashed around till I was purple was a single Yellow Chat. I think I was too surprised to be that gutted. I really thought the Jiff Chat was in the bag there, and it would be as easy as finding Jiff lemons on pancake day (to borrow a Bowleyism.)

So on we drove, back to the main road. At least nothing else that day could be worse than dipping a dozen Yellow Chats right? Wrong. Try this. As we drove on towards Hall's Creek, we'd got to a point about 20km from the Wyndham junction, but still c305km from Hall's Creek. Nicky was driving and I'd just noticed what I took to be a sizeable falcon ahead and to the right, and was waiting for it to show some colour. When it did I found myself shouting Grey Falcon! As it had pale grey upperparts and no dark hood at all. This is a very quiet road, and we drove for several hours that day. 99% of the time it would have been possible to stop immediately, but right then there was not only a car coming up behind us, but also one ahead coming the other way! By the time Nicky could stop the bird was gone and we were left on the quiet road without a vehicle in sight scanning hopelessly in the heat. Once I saw what colour it was I just concentrated on making sure it was actually a falcon and not a Grey Goshawk, the only possible confusion species. The bird simply refused to look like anything other than a falcon until I lost it, but the brevity of the view will always leave me wondering if I can trust my mind on this. Tragic or what? The next time I saw a Grey Goshawk was about an hour later, while Nicky was driving. It too was gliding around on slightly raised wings, though in a tighter circle. It was immediately obviously a Grey Goshawk and remained looking like a Grey Goshawk at all times. I think I might have to kill myself.

So the day wasn't going that well. Never mind though because Rest Stop Bill had recently seen Painted Finches coming to drink at a couple of pools at our proposed stop for the night past Hall's Creek, at Mary Pool. He drew a mud map and said to stake out the furthest 2 pools up the creek bed from the camping area. Luckily it was possible to find a hiding spot where both pools could be clearly seen. Loads of birds came down to drink evening and morning and we had our closest views of drinking Budgerigars. Heaps of honeyeaters dive-bombed the water rather than standing to drink (maybe they were feeding too?). We saw 2 Golden-backed and a couple of Grey-fronted Honeyeaters, heaps of Zebra Finches, a Collared Sparrowhawk up to it's belly in the water, and of course not a single Painted Finch.

We set off onwards to Derby, stopping to check out finches a few times seen from the car on stony spinnie-covered ground. All were Zebras. We had a smart highlight not long out of Mary Hole though, in the form of 2 fantastic Ground Cuckoo-Shrikes.

On arriving at Derby we drove out to the wharf and I had a poke about in the mangroves to the right, generally feeling useless and incapable of finding the 2 mangrove specialities I figured I should be looking for in there. Pishing brought in a Brown Honeyeater and a Singing Honeyeater. I think they felt sorry for me. I quickly gave up and we walked round the circular wharf area. Before leaving I had one last poke about and thought I'd try squeaking this time. Rocketting out of cover came a whopping White-breasted Whistler. A rather messy immature male, but an impressive bird nonetheless. What a bill! Bet it'll look right dapper when it grows up. Hooray!

This morning I discovered that the mangroves are more accessible if you take the left turn to the boat ramp before getting to the wharf, and park at the end. Here birds I saw included a female White-breasted Whistler, a couple of Mangrove Grey Fantails, a Broad-billed Flycatcher, and eventually after srabbling into the thick of the mangroves, great views of a couple of Dusky Gerygones.

We're now in Broome, and hopefully the cavalry will be arriving on the morrow.

Just realised that this post could come across as being a bit overly negative. sorry about that. Just trying to convey some downs as well as ups.

1426 WHITE-BREASTED WHISTLER
1427 Mangrove Grey Fantail
1428 DUSKY GERYGONE

Photos: 1. Ground Cuckoo-Shrike, 2. Comb-crested Jacana, 3. Sunset at the Billabong

 

[Amurfalcon]

Great read as always Larry, and really like the pictures on the bottom!

 

[Larry Sweetland]

Broome and onward

Thanks Scott :t:

We picked up Tony at Broome airport on the 5th and stayed a couple of extra nights in the Roebuck Bay campsite. Got drunk on the beach watching the staircase to the moon effect, and noticed had lost my bins when we were nearly back off the beach. It was dark and the tide was coming in. The 3 of us and another camper searched with torches for over an hour, and finally Tony found them just in time. 15 minutes more and they'd have been underwater.

We stayed for 4 nights at Broome Bird Observatory, and I must say that I liked it so much that I bought the T shirt, thus risking looking even more like a dorky birdnerd. The staff, with representatives from the UK, Colombia, USA and Australia,were infectiously bubbly, friendly and helpful, and lent me a scope to use while we were there. Various tours and involvement are possible for visitors, but one course that the staff should perhaps consider running in my opinion would be "how to MC your daily bird log", which I found to be the most entertaining one I can remember experiencing, and the first one to recall an episode of the Vicar of Dibley. These guys also weren't fooled for a second when we tried to pass off a photo of a leucistic Silver Gull taken in Broome as a 1st summer Iceland Gull. Of course.

We went on one tour, which is the tour out onto Roebuck Station to see the Yellow Chats. This costs 70 bucks a head, but truly came up with the goods as we ended up seeing more than 30 of them, a couple of which were the full custard. Prior to our visit there had only been one Oriental Plover sighting this season, but luckily for us they chose to arrive that day, with a flock of 30 odd on the Yellow Chat tour, then scattered sightings daily in with the other waders at high tide roosts.

I was over optimistic however when it came to other birds I hoped might be possible here. 3 species of buttonquail and even Grass Owl used to be possible out on the plains, but overgrazing has lead to their recent disappearance. There are long term plans for change of land ownership though, with management for wildlife, so hopefully some of these species will return in the future. Kimberley Flycatcher is also rarer here than I'd hoped, and I should have searched for it further east.

I was in with a chance however of Asian Dowitcher, 9 of which were seen not long before our visit. Unfortumately the height of the tides while we were there meant that getting a chance to effectively look through a decent proportion of the godwits was impossible. Most of them roosted far away. Even though I spent a lot of time looking through thousands of godwits I couldn't find one. Which the staff of course found progessively more amusing. Bless them.

The obs area was fantastic for waders, and we saw White-headed Stilt, Red-necked Avocet, Pied Oystercatcher, Far Eastern Curlew, Whimbrel, Bar-tailed Godwit, Black-tailed Godwit, Great Knot, Red Knot, Curlew Sandpiper, Broad-billed S, Common S, Sharp-tailed S, Terek S, Marsh S, Red-necked Stint, Grey-tailed Tattler, Turnstone, Greenshank, Red-capped Plover, Oriental P, Greater Sand P, Lesser Sand P, Grey P, Pacific Golden P, and Australian Pratincole, with Sanderling and Masked Lapwing added in nearby Broome. As well as the dowitchers we also dipped some much rarer Redshanks, which funnily enough I wasn't quite as bothered about.

In fact my face took so badly to the dowitcher dip, that what started life as a small spot on the scope-side of my nose has now developed into a full-blown facial infection. One eye is partially closed and using bins is no longer possible without bashing the bump. I look a bit like something you might meet at a bar in Star Trek, and Nicky has started calling me Odo. I've been to the hospital and have just got some antibiotics, so hopefully I'll be able to use bins soon.

Broome was good for mangrove birds too, and we picked up Mangrove Golden and White-breasted Whistlers, Broad-billed Flycatcher, Mangrove Grey Fantail and Dusky Gerygone around Crab Creek. We also saw Mangrove Golden Whistler and Red-headed Myzomela in the mangroves not far from Coles in Broome.

Hopefully Tony will fill in any bits I've missed out.

It was sad to leave, but what can you do? They probably had Asian Dowitcher in the bird bath next day. Our next stop for the night as we headed south was Cape Keraudren, where we camped at the cliff-top camping area. An on spec poke about in the grassy bowl below the camping area before breakfast came up trumps with at least 1, possibly 2 Little Buttonquail. There were also at least 9 Brown Quail and large numbers of Australasian Bush-Lark knocking about.

We made it to Mairee Pool for the next night, where Jonathan had seen many Painted Finches a few weeks ago. We saw several, maybe 30+, during the first hour of daylight, mostly in ones and twos in or over the spinifex and rocks along the track that loosely parallels the creek away from the highway. Star Finches were more prevalent in the evening at this site, and we also saw a Little Eagle, Cockatiels, Budgies, and western forms of Spinifex Pigeon, White-plumed Honeyeater and Australian Reed Warbler here.

After leaving the site, a midmorning stop to change drivers at the pull off on the east side of the road just after crossing the Fortescue river produced another 6 Painted Finches.

We're now in Exmouth and if anyone has the technology to PM me with link to calls of Spinifexbird and Rufous-crowned Emu-Wren that we could download onto Nicky's mp3 player that would be magic. We tried Shothole Canyon briefly yesterday evening, but no joy with these yet, though Little Woodswallow and Grey-headed Honeyeater were welcome additions to Tony's list, and we saw an Echidna and our first Thorny Devil yesterday too.

1429 YELLOW CHAT
1430 ORIENTAL PLOVER
1431 Mangrove Golden Whistler
1432 LITTLE BUTTONQUAIL
1433 PAINTED FINCH

 

[pandachris]

Great read as ever, Larry.

I bothered to bring my life list up to date last week because I thought that you were getting close to beating it on what is, if you're honest with yourselves, little more than a glorified day-trip but you've actually got 49 to go I'm delighted to say, perhaps 50 if anyone can ID the 'Bukit Fraser' call that I posted on the ID forum last week and 51 if we get Citril Finch next Sunday - by which time you'll probably be 5-10 closer. Must try harder.

Did that Harry bloke ever get in touch with you?

 

[Larry Sweetland]

Exmouth area

It was 3rd time lucky with Spinifexbird at Shothole canyon. We had great views of 2 birds on our first morning visit which was yesterday. Both were about 9.5km up the track, one alongside the track, the other along the dry creek bed which forms a crescent from the track to the left. Heard a couple of others too, and they seem to prefer the flatter gorge bottom with very big spinifex under mallee. The slopes are stonier, and I'm guessing might be the area to concentrate on for the emu-wrens on our next visit. This site also produced Australian Ringneck, Red-browed Pardalote and Variegated Fairy-Wren.

Heading round north of Exmouth into Cape Range yesterday, we also picked up Rufous Calamanthus, Crested Bellbird, Spiny-cheeked Honeyeater, Wedge-tailed Shearwater, Fairy Tern, Western Bowerbird and what we reckon are Little Crows. An 8 lifer day for Tony, and today he's off to Perth to hopefully bag a heap more before returning to Cairns.

I'm really going to have to control my birding, bashing my bump with bins keeps openning it up and it just won't heal. It's hard to not bird though when there's the chance of a new emu-wren round the corner. Especially now I've got this new target of catching up with Pandachris! Nothing from Harry by the way Chris, and good luck with Citril Finch.

1434 SPINIFEXBIRD

 

[Larry Sweetland]

We had another bash at Shothole Canyon yesterday morning , but no luck with Rufous-crowned Emu-Wren. This would appear to be a very difficult bird to find here without a tape. It was then time to wave goodbye to Tony, hopefully not for the last time. Fingers crossed for a successful couple of days around Perth Tony :t:

We returned to town, and on the oval opposite the Caltex garage that we'd previously filled up in, a mere 200m from the camp site we stayed in, we discovered about 20 Banded Lapwings that we'd managed to overlook until then. Oops.

So it was back to Sh#thole Canyon again to see if the spinifex had grown at all. We spent the night there and this morning, and still no emu-wren. Can't even find a link to what they sound like let alone a way of downloading one, but all the likely high pitched noises we've heard so far have been traceable to fairy-wrens. This morning's birding did however turn up another Spinifexbird and more surprisingly a group of 6 Painted Finches.

Face still won't heal over so getting a bit worried about it.

Here's some pics

1. the magnificent 3.... Go for your bins! 2. leucistic Silver Gull, 3. Thorny Devil