I went on holiday and my first stop was northern Victoria around Wodonga, where the Murray River, Ovens River and Seven Creeks in Euroa were raging torrents after all the rain.
Prior to leaving the Bellarine I was lucky to walk around the farm in Wallington to conduct a birds on farms survey.
I saw many species, including a pair of brown goshawks, a few fan-tailed cuckoos and the resident small flock of weebills.
I had a lovely time touring along the Murray looking at birds. I saw many yellow rosellas that are actually a different colour form of crimson rosellas. Rosellas vary from a deep crimson red to a pale yellow due to different habitats, climate and humidity are major causes of the colour variation in this species.
In Deniliquin I saw my first superb parrots and a beautiful azure kingfisher flew just next to me when I was on the path next to the Edward River.
In Mildura I was fortunate to be taken on a one-on-one tour around a property owned by Fiona and Phil, who have spent many years rehabilitating and planting Mallee native plants. Fiona and Phil have a
Website – malleeconservation.com.au – that outlines the work that they have done and the fauna that can be seen on their property.
In a few hours I saw 49 bird species, including white-browed babbler, southern whiteface, singing honeyeater, spiny-cheeked honeyeater, rufous songlark, regent parrot and little friarbird. The property includes a few wetlands that were overflowing due to recent rains, and this had attracted many great egrets and white-throated herons.
I received an email from John in Leopold. He updated me on the brown thornbill pair that are regular visitors to his birdbath. On the left-hand side of his bird bath there is a scat which is a cluster of peppercorn tree berries, possibly formed as a fox scat and brought to the bird bath by the local pied currawong.
John has found a number of these clusters lately in his paddock, whereas previously the berries were left regularly in one of the three bird baths, and John supposed they were regurgitated by a bird into the bird bath. John also noted that the pied currawong has also brought a cluster of berries with dirt that were picked up from below the peppercorn tree and dropped it onto our car in the car port.
John also photographed a few yellow-rumped thornbill pair that he observed catching insects in the grass. He thinks that they are possibly nesting on his property. He has also observed magpie larks constructing their amazing mud nest and the pied currawong gathering nesting material.
John also has observed a pair of black kites that are possibly nesting in the large trees on his neighbour’s property. One of the photos showed a whistling kite being pursued in flight by a collared sparrowhawk.
I received a message from Doug in Ocean Grove. Doug has recently travelled to North Queensland, where he saw two of the birds he was hoping to observe, namely a Pacific baza at Rockhampton Botanical Gardens and a Noisy Pitta at Mary Cairncross Reserve.
Doug sent me the photos that he took of the baza. The Pacific baza is a medium-sized, long-tailed bird of prey with a prominent crest. I have only had a glimpse of this bird at the Cairns Botanical Gardens, so I enjoyed Doug’s photos immensely.
