Little Birds South of Alice Springs

I managed to have the opportunity to head south of Alice Springs recently. I drove a "road" (really just a fairly upmarket track) for about 7 kms and was stunned by the amount and variety of birdlife available for viewing and photographing.

Pied and Black Honeyeaters as well as Crimson Chats seem to be everywhere around Central Australia at the moment, as well as the Woodswallows. I was also hoping to see a few other species though, and was delighted to find Cinnamon Quail-thrushes in numbers, as well as Southern Whiteface, both Red-capped and Hooded Robins, Chestnut-rumped Thornbills, and a highlight was catching up with Bourke's Parrots.

If you are thinking about heading to the Centre, any time in the next few months will be a wonderful time as the explosion of bird numbers is set to continue.

Cinnamon Quail-thrush

Southern Whiteface

Bourke's Parrot

Crimson Chats

Hooded Robin

Red-capped Robin

Terrick Terrick National Park

Driving into Terrick Terrick is a complete contrast to the surrounding area. From farming plains to trees, scrub and rocky outcrops. It is little wonder the birds choose to come and mingle with one another. Gone are the Little and Long-billed Corellas, the Sulphur-crested Cockatoos, replaced by Robins and Treecreepers and Thornbills. Not for the first time I found myself in bird-wonderland by myself. Everyone else must still be enjoying family and friends during the holidays, rather than visiting National Parks. I did actually see a couple of other cars, but generally had the place to myself.

Arriving at a new location is always both exciting and frustrating. Tuning your ears to the new sounds of the bush, remembering old calls once easily identified, straining to hear the "odd call out", eyes darting from treetops to ground cover. Terrick Terrick has all of the above. On the drive in towards the picnic area, I stopped upon hearing a burst of bird call activity. Red-rumped Parrots and Yellow-rumped Thornbills everywhere, just in a small pocket of woodland. I continued up the track and sat in the car in the carpark, listening, waiting to decide if here was ok. Sounds started coming from everywhere. Mainly Brown Treecreepers, but also Rufous Whistlers, Red-capped and Hooded Robins, Yellow Thornbills, Restless Flycatchers and Southern Whiteface.

Walking through Terrick Terrick is so much easier than lots of bird-watching spots I have been to. Under the tall trees is mostly open with a few fallen logs and small grass patches. The birds can be quite friendly, or sometimes extremely annoying as they chirp away high in the canopy without ever coming down. The picnic area was a good place to start, but eventually I drove through the middle of the Park until I exited on the far north western edge.

It was a fun few hours spent, and the completed list numbered 24, maybe not as many as I had hoped but there were some nice species in that lot. Some of them made taking photos pretty easy, others a little harder. ere are some of the better photos:

Sacred Kingfisher

Hooded Robin

Jacky Winter

Restless Flycatcher

Rufous Whistler

Southern Whiteface

Yellow Thornbill

Spinifexbird, Brown Falcon, Eurasian Coot, Hooded Robin, Little Crow, Mistletoebird, Spotted Harrier photos

An enjoyable drive out to Papunya. Started the day early and found some Spinifexbird with a friend, then on to a variety of birds along the way. Hope you enjoy the photos.

Alice Springs and surrounds - where the birding just keeps on keeping on

Alice Springs must be the Australian birding mecca at the moment. A few weeks ago a Grey Falcon was spotted during the BirdLife Central Australia/Red Centre Bird Festival Twitchathon. Add to that a credible sighting of Brolgas flying over one of the suburbs (yes we have suburbs in Alice Springs), and in the near future a Princess Parrot tour will head out of Alice Springs with some very lucky participants (see the link here). For those of you waiting for the trip report, I can't remember the last bird I saw when I wasn't on site!

The Twitchathon gives you a good indication of what you can see without too much effort - 71 species in a 12 hour period was the winner, but the last placed team saw 64. I imagine most who don't live in the Alice Springs region would have seen over 10 lifers in just that one day. Get up to Alice Springs!

Today I went out on one of our close-to-town dirt roads. This was to test out how my hand would manage driving on dirt roads as I am keen to resume work as soon as I can. Result - not yet! And the road was not at all bumpy/corrugated. However, whilst nursing the fingers, I decided to pull over and let a water truck go by. I pulled into a nice horseshoe pull-over area and decided to get out of the car as the truck was going quite slow. I saw a bird fly up onto a nearby tree. It looked a bit like a "TREECREEPER!" I raced around the other side of the car and got out the camera, complete with monopod. All thoughts of my now aching fingers were gone as I hurriedly got back to a position where I could get a photo. Varied Sittellas often catch me out, not to mention other birds that would like to be a Treecreeper, but my first suspicion was correct. I watched as it "clawed" its way into a more favourable photo position, hoping that my hand would holdout. It sort of did. Good enough photos for an ID. Just in time as the truck then went past and the bid flew off. I returned to the car, pretty chuffed. As I was putting the camera back in the car, the Treecreeper flew onto a tree almost next to the car. This time it wasn't quite in the sun as much, but much closer, and much better chance of getting a decent shot. I clicked away, aware the trunk was getting the focus most of the time, but I was curtailed in movement by my monopod-assisted one-hand operation. After about 10 minutes, the bird finally flew beyond photographic usefulness.

White-browed Treecreeper

In this stretch of outback road, the Budgerigars and Cockatiels were around but not in huge numbers. Weebills were busy collecting nesting material, a female Hooded Robin sat on the wire fence no more than 5 metres away, Masked Woodswallows, Black-faced Woodswallows, Southern Whiteface, Zebra Finches, the list would fill the page but instead here are a couple of photos:

Hooded Robin

Masked Woodswallow

Southern Whiteface

Variegated Fairy-wren

Weebill

In total about 30 species. All in woodland that most people just drive past. If you are reading this you are probably a birder. If you haven't ever been to Alice Springs, or haven't been for a while, come and enjoy the smorgasboard of birds that are on offer now. We never know how long it lasts.

Splendid Fairy-wren, Willie Wagtail, Hooded Robin, Yellow-rumped and Chestnut-rumped Thornbill bird photos

the Splendid Fairy-wren male (pictured above) really does have a striking presence in the bush. This particular one took a little while to strike the right pose. Photos sequence below:

Others, although not as colourful still make some striking poses.

Willie Wagtail

Hooded Robin

Yellow-rumped Thornbill

 

 Chestnut-rumped Thornbill

Hooded and Red-capped Robin photos

I've been very lucky to have some close-up action from the Robins. The Hooded Robins are quite a lot bigger than the Red-capped Robins, and today I heard them make sounds a bit like parrots as the younger ones chased each other through the mulga scrub. I hadn't heard that before, and wonder what range of noises they really have. I often wonder about the noises small birds make, quite often they are not dissimilar from the natural noises of the surrounding bush.

Anyway, it is difficult to choose the photos as when I am as close as I have been over the past few days, there are many wonderful close-up opportunities, but I've scaled the photos back to 4 for each. The Hooded Robins were even more compliant than the Red-capped Robins so I'll start with them:

Hooded Robin

Red-capped Robin