Saturday, June 1, 2013

215) Some 'Local' birds


Rose Robin
We've taken a few local birding trips lately, to explore new areas.  On this day, we took a trip up to "the Gap" - just west of Brisbane. This is a popular local recreation area, because it is the biggest forest reserve close to the big city.  It was a group trip to encourage people new to birding.  We quickly lost the group when a Rose Robin came in sight, they're just so irresistable to photographers.

To continue the birthday celebration into the weekend, we went to the Connondale Ranges and Dirk had fun using the 4WD for fording creeks in the dark (we drove to the campsite after work on a Friday).  This is a place I (Nancy) had been wanting to visit, because it's in my study site and is a refuge for many species.

Here is a less frequently seen Pale Yellow Robin, another rainforest bird that is a close cousin to the more-commonly encountered Eastern Yellow Robin.  The distinguishing feature on these little guys is the white around their beak.
The male Golden Whistlers are always so spectacular!  Plus, when they hang out together with their girlfriends, they help us id the females of the species that don't wear quite as attention-getting outfits.
It's amazing that Dirk was finally able to get a picture of one of these birds--a Bell Miner.  They hang out in big groups, calling to each other from high in the canopy with a (what I think is beautiful) Tink! Tink! sounding like a multitude of chiming bells.  You'd think with so many birds calling, it would be EASY to spot them--but YOU try it!!  Their green feathers are spectacular camoflauge in the canopy.  But up close, I love their matching bright orange beak and legs and feet, and the bright yellow under their eyes that go with the lovely shades of green in their feathers.
Earlier in the day we knew we heard Yellow-tailed Black-Cockatoos calling, but couldn't find them.  Because they have such a distinctive call, we counted them anyway, but later we came to a screeching halt when Dirk looked off the road as we drove through a pine plantation and said "WHAT was that?!!"  Here was this cockatoo, sitting on the ground, happily munching pine cones.  Nearby, a juvenile cockatoo was begging for snack, too.  It turned out this was a popular cockatoo hangout, and we saw probably 15 more down the road feasting on pine cones.  Fantastic birds, you gotta love having parrots and cockatoos as neighbors!

A very photogenic Royal Spoonbill on yet another foray, this one out to Lake Coombabah. 


Reflections of a beautiful stand of Melaleuca (Ti Tree).  There was also a stunning Azure Kingfisher, and Australasian grebe, and Rufous Whistlers (male and female) in this area.

A cuckoo eating a bug in his jail-stripe green pjs.  Oh, yeah, that's just his regular outfit!  These birds are so pretty, if we can just forgive them their nasty habit of parasitizing other birds.


Dirk just can't resist photographing the little robins.  They ARE quite spectacular.  I'd give anything to know what they look like to each other--we can't see all the wavelengths of light they see, but they look almost fluorescent, even to me!

Bwah-ha-ha!  A ghoulishly good birthday cake compliments of Dirk!  I always thought it was nice having a birthday in the glorious days of spring with the lilacs blooming and the meadowlarks singing...  a little different here, down under!!