Yellow Brick Road

The Emerald lakes wetlands has always been known as the Yellow Brick Road to my family. Bike rides, cross country training, dog walks is what this place has always meant. Visiting the wetland today to go bird watching meant a much slower walk than usual and I was surprised at the avian activity I had never before apriciated.

At the entrance of the track was a pair of Olive Backed Orioles incubating. Meters from this was a little friar bird feeding its fledgling and looking through the trees of the little friar birds I saw rainbow lorikeets leaving their tree hollow nest.

There was a ridiculous amount of bearded dragons and from one spot I could count six sunbaking. The superb fairy wrens were also in abundance flitting about making me dizzy.

Three Australian pelicans were resting on a pontoon with a noisy Australian darter. To the left of them I was surprised to see a single comb crested jacana walking on the lilly pads. I was able to get quite close to the bird with out bothering it too much. It must be used to all of the golfers that pass by the lake. Above me a striped honeyeater chirped loudly and rudely left immediately after announcing its presence.

Also on the trackI had the joy of watching a pair of Willie wag tails building their sweet nest. They would bring leaves and bark to the structure and rub spider webs from their beaks around the edges.

Other birds noted were: Brown honeyeaters, Pacific black ducks, Magpie geese, hard heads, Eurasian coots, purple swamphens, Maggie larks, pied butcherbirds, magpie, great egret, pied cormorant, little black cormorant, scarlet honeyeaters, noisy miners, scaley breasted lorikeets.

Mum Dad or Helper?

I had recently visited some friends doing research on variegated fairy wrens. I had learnt from them that these wrens have male helpers that will contribute to the building of the nest and feeding of the chicks. I had left this visit hopeing to find a variegated nest of my own that I could observe. 

Days later I was excited to come across one being built in some dry grass on the side of a path. The female wren was bringing long pieces of grass to the nearly completed and well camouflaged little dome. I was unwilling very close to the nest upon discovery and worried that I would cause it to become abandoned I left immediately.

I would occasionally walk past this spot on my birding days and noted not much action at the area for almost a week. I was pleased one day to see a little chestnut spot in the shadows of the nest and moments later a distressed female flying out of the bushes. I was happy to see the nest being used still and walked on. 

Days later there was no sign of a bird in the nest and I approached it, I gently tipped the bottom so that I could see into the soft chamber. Three tiny eggs freckled with light brown spots were hidden in the grass home. Each time I had passed the nest since that day all I could see was mummy's chesnut beak as she was incubating her preciouts eggs.

It felt like for ever but four days ago the moment I had been waiting for had arrived. No mum was to be seen. I peeked inside the nest and three tiny birds the colour of my pale skin and with black unopened eyes were resting in the bottom of their temporary home. 

Moments later an irritated mummy with a beak full of caterpillar chipped and flapped her wings. This brought the attention of two males in breeding plumage. I backed away from the nest and the males fed the chicks. Mum was more reluctant but eventually perched onto the nest beak down and but up. 

This morning I revisited to find the eyes are now open and the babies have pin featheres. I also noted a male early in his first moult tending to the young. He had a small area of black creeping into his chestnut beak. He had sweet blue dots above his eyes as and some chestnut and blue lightly over his shoulders. I was excited to get a photo of this plumage as I had only just learnt that males look like females in their first year and that their beaks are a chestnut before they first moult! This just made sexing wrens more difficult!

The Eyes Have It

Black winged stilts are beautiful. I love them but like many wild birds this love is never  reciprocated. Often I will approach them confidently and they don't seem bothered by me then one will give me a look, make a peeping call and they will all go hangout at the other side of the lake. A place bothersome humans have no access to.

Yesterday three BWS were hanging out at lake Lenore which is small and shallow. When approached they would fly to the other side which is in front of a bird hide. This is the first time for me the birds have been so close to the bird hide. Admittedly when they went back to the first place I herded them back to the bird hide....

Never before have I noticed their beautiful red eyes! Pied birds with red eyes are an ultimate fashion statement. So stunning.

Pardalote Parents of the spotted variety

Well its spring and I did not intend for this to be a blog entirely about babies but what the heck, when I find something that interests me I will post it. Even if it means babies for the rest of this season. hehe.

Yesterday I spotted a pair of spotted (see what I did there) pardalotes (yellow rumped) perched on a low branch with beaks full of goodies. I knew what that meant and although reluctant, daddy eventually popped into a hole in the embankment and quickly out again beak empty. 

A couple of unwelcome visitors arrived at the scene (other than me) and mummy spread out her red tail feathers and called loudly which was enough to make the yellow faced honey eater and white browed scrub wren find somewhere else to be.

I also left them to their duties as the new parents seemed to be under a bit of stress.

I did visit again this morning for some shots and knowing where the nest was and what branches the birds preferred I did not need to bother them for long. 

In the following images you have mummy entering and leaving the nest. Followed by daddy and his entrance and exit.

These birds are quite small about 8-10 cm. They usually are high up in eucalyptus trees where you are unable to see their wonderful detail. I was so excited to see them down and up close only meters from me. It is taking every bit of self control not to roll my swag out and play the third wheel. 

The beginnings of an avian stalker.

I am a wildlife science student who began her degree with no idea about where she would like to be in the future, only that it was to be outside working with animals. Last year I studied studied a course called "Australian Terrestrial Vertebrates," known as ATV. Here I learnt to identify tracks, scats and other traces of wildlife. This means that each week I looked at bones and poo trying to identify what Australian animal it was from. I was one of those children constantly told to put that disgusting object down so naturally I took a liking to this subject. 

One part of the class involved birdwatching. We all borrowed binoculars and bird field guides and met up at the university lakes to identify the species we had seen and write about their behaviors as well as methods of identifying them. This class opened my eyes to the world of birds and since then I have not been able to stop chasing the thrill of observing a different behavior or spotting a new bird. I think my teacher would be surprised and probably happy to know how his lessons have stuck with me (based on my grades from that course ;)). I Still don't know exactly what I want to do in the future but I hope it has something to do with those flying feathered creatures.