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.

Bush fires around the Observatory

This in fact is not smoke but whats know as a Willie Willie a small whirlwind of dust and anything else that can be picked up. They can last from seconds to minutes and this huge one was around for a good hour on the plain.

The surreal glow of fire in the smoke at night made for a si-fi skyscape !

Australian Owlet Nightjar !! or are they Chinchilla??!!

We decided to have a go at tape luring at night for owlet nightjar at a site where Matt had heard them calling at the 12 mile cut through.

We put a 12 m net up across a small clearing and set the MP3 playing. Within minutes a bird started calling and after about 5 mins it started flying around calling. After another few minutes it went straight into the net!

While we were processing the bird another started calling and we manged to net that one also.

The plumage on the birds is amazingly cryptic and its no wonder they are so well camaflaged when sitting around in trees.

Some invertebrates and Glossy Ibis

Cable Beach Sunsets

Random wader shots

A trip to Cable beach was worth it to retrap the Red capped plover chick we banded some 4 km south of where we now found it and to see the Pacific golden plover which has apparently wintered there for several years now...assuming its the same bird !

Of course the ones paying attention will notice that the firts bird is in fact an Oriental plover, one of 213 which have been feeding on the over grazed area of the paddock behind the observatory...well they do like short grass to feed in !






Two shots of the Pacific golden plover above and below showing the long legs an dthe delicate shape of the bird.



and here is the long distance runner ! the Red capped plover chick orginally ringed about 4 km down the beach taken all the way up the beach by its parents who were still buzzing us several 100 meters away.




You all thought i was going to call this an adult Red capped plover didn't you??!! In fact its a Greater sand plover, one of several hundred running around on teh beach at high tide.