Broad billed sandpiper bonanza!!

The Australian Wader study Group are at the observatory for 3 weeks led by Dr Clive Minton to catch shorebirds to place metal bands and engraved yellow flags to allow identification in the field. At a canon netting session we caught over 60 Broad billed sandpipers a fantastic little wader which is not normally sampled in such numbers. The first picture shows the obvious longish bill with a slight droop towards the end.

This bird was a bit of a surprise as the Black over White colour flags means that it was marked in China, we are yet to find the details of this bird.

This photo is of a first winter bird, quite contrasting in the head pattern colour of black and white and this individual shows very well teh 'double' supercillium.

Bush Point again to count shorebirds - Paradise??

We took the 4WD's across the plains and creeks to get to Bush Point again to do the shorebird counts as part of the Monitoring Yellow Sea Migrants in Australia program.

The beach is totally unspoilt and a fantatic haven for shorebirds both at roost and as a feeding site. The main species involved are Bar-tailed godwit, Great knot, Greater sandplover, Red necked stint, Red capped plover and small numbers of Sanderling, Oriental plover, Red knot, Eastern curlew, Whimbrel..........some 40,000 birds counted ! plus several thousand terns, mostly Whiskered, Gull billed and Little tern, small numbers fo Caspian and Common tern.