WINGELLO VILLAGE LIFE INTERVIEW

My thanks to Michelle Hrlec for broadcasting her interview with me on her blog talk radio show Wingello Village Life last Sunday afternoon. She and I went for a walk near Gambells Rest in Morton NP last week, on a pristine Autumn morning, and I rambled on about anything and everything to do with birds and birding. Michelle asked interesting questions on migration, weather, magpies etc. You can hear our discussion at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/wingello-village-life - click on Episode 6. I hope you enjoy it. LJ, Anzac Day 2012

SUMMER SHOTS

IN HIDING

I'm surprised I'm yet to unearth the following birds in Bundanoon: Brown Falcon, Australian Kestrel (seen one at Exeter), Straw-necked Ibis (I've seen many at Moss Vale), Grey Currawong (seen them at Penrose), White-winged Chough (seen them at Penrose)... Where are you hiding?

LJ, April 11 2012.

SUMMER/AUTUMN BIRD RECORDS FOR BUNDY

Below are a few Bundanoon bird sightings worth noting (in reverse chronological order) from this year. Rainbow Lorikeets were around a lot more than in past years. Gang-gangs Cockatoos and Wedge-tailed Eagles turned up regularly. A Weebill was a great record. Repeat visits to the swamp by Ferndale Reserve proved fruitful (I was doing this mainly for writing purposes; I recently entered the Voiceless Writing Prize with a long essay on Bundanoon)... a Latham's Snipe turned up on one occasion. Unfortunately, the Crescent Honeyeaters I heard near Bonnie View in Nov/Dec 2011, were not heard again. So, have a read below - it's a bit repetitive! I've now found 135 species in Bundanoon.

6.4.12
Home - waves of Yellow-faced Honeyeaters heading north, 1 Gang-gang Cockatoo
Oval area - 2 Peregrine Falcons (high up)
Ferndale Swamp - 1 White-eared Honeyeater (heard)
Old Wingello Rd - 1 White-throated Treecreeper (scaling a telegraph pole: an amusing first for me: I guess it's just another tree to a WTT)

2.4.12
Bonnie View - 1 White-eared Honeyeater heard calling on escarpment to east (first time I've heard one here), Pilotbird (heard)
Beauchamp Cliffs - 1 Superb Lyrebird
Home - 2 Wedge-tailed Eagles, 1 Lewin's Honeyeater, an Eastern Yellow Robin (heard nearby; closest to home it's ever been)

26.3.12
Home - 1 Rainbow Lorikeet

25.3.12
Ferndale Swamp - 1 White-eared Honeyeater (back, after months away; there must be some altitudinal dispersal with the local birds), 1 Azure Kingfisher (!), many Grey Fantails, 1 White-throated Gerygone (sticking around?), Grey Shrike-thrushes (bathing and eating worms on the ground)

24.3.12
Home - 6 Varied Sittellas flying over (a rarity), 7 Yellow-rumped Thornbills flying over (unusual), Lewin's Honeyeater (first time in the backyard)
Penrose Rd - 4 Gang-gang Cockatoos (always good to see these beauties)
Ellsmore Rd - 1 Wedge-tailed Eagle (low, heading west, over paddocks)

23.2.12
The Gullies Rd - 1 Rufous Fantail (such active things; that rufous is so striking), 6 Grey Fantails

21.3.12.
Bonnie View - 2 Chestnut-rumped Heathwrens (I prefer the name Hylacola, really; these birds are notoriously difficult to see; my view of one was fleeting; the other was heard making a scrubwren-like trill), 10 White-throated Needletails (arcing high over southern gullies), Pilotbird (heard, I've not seen one yet in Bundy), Superb Lyrebird (heard)

15.3.12
Home - 7 Gang-gang Cockatoos (a cracking number - one rarely sees this no. together)

11.3.12
Home - 2 Wedge-tailed Eagles, a few Rainbow Lorikeets

10.3.12
Ferndale swamp/Bundanoon Sewage Works - 2 Gang-gang Cockatoos, 1 juv. Azure Kingfisher (!), circa 9 Black-fronted Dotterels (the most I've ever seen together, anywhere), 2 Buff-rumped Thornbills (seen now and again), many Red-browed Finches (inc. immatures), 5 Yellow-rumped Thornbills

27.2.12
Home - 2 Wedge-tailed Eagles

24.2.12
Home - 1 Gang-gang Cockatoo (heard)

11.2.12
Ferndale swamp - 1 Weebill seen in the scribbly gum mid-storey on outskirts of oval (Australia's smallest bird; my first Weebill in the Southern Highlands!), 3 Dollarbirds, 2 Wedge-tailed Eagles, Yellow-faced Honeyeaters

4.2.12
Home - 4 Little Ravens (a lot) and 2 Australian Ravens
Ferndale swamp - 1 Australian Reed-warbler, 1 Dollarbird
Quarry Rd - 1 Dollarbird in a paddock
Birchwood Rd - 1 Wedge-tailed Eagle

28.1.12
Home - 2 Gang-gang Cockatoos

26.1.12
Echo Point - 1 Gang-gang Cockatoo (heard), 2 Superb Lyrebirds (heard)
Anzac Parade - 1 Rainbow Lorikeet
Home - 2 Wedge-tailed Eagles

24.1.12
Bundanoon Club - 2 Rainbow Lorikeets

23.1.12
Home - 1 Rainbow Lorikeet

21.1.12
Home - 3 Gang-gang Cockatoos

20.1.12
Bundanoon Pool - 2 Gang-gang Cockatoos

19.1.12
Ferndale swamp/sewage works - 1 female Australasian Shoveler (on swamp water), 1 Dollarbird, 1 European Goldfinch (on ground, sipping water from a puddle; these are seen infrequently)

17.1.12
Ferndale swamp - 4 Dollarbirds (2 of which were dipping momentarily into water), White-necked Heron (sunbathing, with open wings), 1 White-throated Gerygone, a few Dusky Woodswallows, 1 Olive-backed Oriole, Tree Martins, c.20 White-throated Needletails, 2 Leaden Flycatchers, Sacred Kingfishers

16.1.12
Ferndale swamp - 2 Red-browed Treecreepers (the first time I've seen them there), 1 White-throated Gerygone, male Leaden Flycatcher (!)

15.1.12
Ferndale swamp - 1 Latham's Snipe (tremendous stuff: my first record for Bundy: it would've recently flown in from Honshu and Hokkaido in Japan), 1 Leaden Flycatcher, 4 Dollarbirds
Blue Gum Rd - 2 Dollarbirds

7.1.12
Home - 2 Gang-gang Cockatoos

8.1.12
Ferndale swamp/sewage works - I think I MIGHT have seen a Baillon's Creek disappearing into reeds, but I wasn't sure; Dusky Woodswallows, White-necked Heron, 3 Hardhead (unusual)

6.1.12
Grey Gum Lane area - 2 Wedge-tailed Eagles, hunting, falling into stoops

4.1.12
Morton NP (near Gambells Rest) - 1 Australian Owlet-nightjar (heard)

1.1.12
Home - 2 Rainbow Lorikeets

LJ, April 6 2012

HOODED ROBINS IN PENROSE

Well done to avid Bundy birder John Shepherd who found a pair of Hooded Robins near Stingray Swamp at Penrose on Saturday morning. I've got to follow this up. I've not seen a Hooded Robin for about fifteen years. The males are stunning, even though they're pied and dumpy. HRs are listed as 'vulnerable' in NSW by DEC. John's record is the most easterly record I'm aware of. HRs are mostly found west of the Great Dividing Range (and irregularly). Between John and his wife Jenny, the robins of the Southern Highlands are covered!

LJ, March 19 2012.

SOME BLOKES, A BROOM AND A COPPERHEAD

I meant to put this in my previous post. Really, it warrants its own post.

Some time in mid-January, my boy and I were out walking our cocker spaniel. We came to the pub. A drinker, standing in the front beer garden stated flatly, 'Watch out for the brown snake'. Indeed, a brownish snake was moving lethargically along the pavement by the wall that skirts the beer garden. I tied my dog to a railing and my son and I tentatively checked out the snake, which was about fifty centimetres long. Soon, walkers and drinkers alike were all out looking at it.

Consensus had the snake as a Highlands Copperhead, not an Eastern Brown Snake. The serpent got itself into a gutter. One drinker suggested he jump in his Toyota and run the snake over, adding that misguided cliche, 'The only good snake is a dead snake'. One bloke turned up with a broom and approached the snake. I asked him not to kill the thing. A passing 4WD was stopped, so the driver wouldn't crush the Copperhead. The broom-man brushed the snake away, so it slithered sluggishly across the road and retreated into the bushes by the railway station.

This was the fist living Highlands Copperhead I'd seen. My brother-in-law over in Bowral has had to kill a couple as he has many kids to think about. I've seen their cool bodies slung over barbed wire fences.

Herpetologist, Harold Cogger, states, in one of his textbooks, that Exeter is the Copperhead capital of NSW (I saw one there the other day - eastern side of railway line). I guess Bundy would be the other capital.

LJ, March 6 2012.

A FEW THINGS

My Lord, is that actually sunshine I see out there? Let's hope it lasts more than a few hours and we can hang on to what remains of this peculiar, mercurial summer.

Local birder, Jenny Shepherd, claimed to have seen a female Pink Robin foraging in her backyard close to two weeks ago. The tan arrowhead markings in the secondaries convinced her of this. She was sure it wasn't a juvenile whistler or female Scarlet or Flame Robin. If she is right, then this is an tremendous record, as the Southern Highlands is pretty much the northern limit of the bird's range (though one PR was seen in north-west Sydney in the 90s). There was a female in the Australian National Botanic Gardens in Canberra, during May 2011. I've never seen a Pink Robin. I wish I'd been with Jenny when she saw it.

Most of our migratory birds have vanished. I haven't heard a Common Koel (I had an immature at home for quite a while), a Shining Bronze-cuckoo or a Black-faced Monarch, for weeks. Our Channel-billed Cuckoos usually depart late December. Dollarbirds are still around - there was one bird perched on power lines along Birchwood Drive yesterday. I guess he or she will take to the air and push north very soon.

I had the pleasure, a few weeks back now, of watching a pair of Dollarbirds hawking over my yard before nightfall. This went on for about thirty minutes. At one stage, one of the birds was only about fifteen feet above my head. Neither bird made any noise when foraging. Sometimes, they dissected the full moon.

Not long ago, I happened to see, with the aid of a torch, a trapdoor in its front garden burrow consuming a centipede. It took a while to eat it. This trapdoor didn't have any 'trap door' at the entrance to its home.

I'm eager to tramp down to Erith Coal Mine in the next couple of days so as to see how much water is powering over the scarp there.

The freetail bat is still living in the pergola. My son and I saw it arrive home this morning at 6:25am.

There are so many slugs and snails about at the moment. It's a little off-putting. My wife trod on a leopard slug (?) the night before last... the creature's ooze stuck to the sole of her boot. I tried to scrape the ooze off her boot to no avail.

You probably didn't need to read that last bit. Who really cares about slugs and their slime? My apologies.

LJ, March 5 2012.