The birds and the bees - photos from Alice Springs

Recently I've been restricted to local birding, but still managed a few nice shots. Some excitement around the house was a bee swarm, not a hive, just a huge group of bees all clumped together in the lemon tree. They stayed for a couple of days then flew off. The internet was very useful to work out what was likely to happen.

The local sewage ponds in Alice Springs are being visited by the returning long-range migrants/waders, and ID can be a bit tricky as most of the time they don't stand next to each other, but there are a few I have managed to work out after seeing them in flight and hearing them as they fly off.

The Bee Swarm

Grey-crowned Babblers in the backyard

Black-winged Stilt 

Common Greenshank

Common Sandpiper

Grey Teals

Pacific Black Duck 

Red-necked Avocets

Variegated Fairy-wrens

Disaster or blessing? Time will tell

I have had my Canon 7D for about 16 months now. The other day I used it in the car, then got out and went to take more photos and something had happened. The autofocus wasn't working. Initially I thought it was a problem with the lens, which has been playing up recently.
After trying other lenses, I started to twig something else was wrong. After searching on-line, I found a lot of threads about a particular problem with the Canon DSLRs. Extreme change in temperature can do something to the chip inside the camera. Alas for me, the issue with mine was the autofocus.
Still, I am a bird-watcher, and after a few days of just being a bird-watcher, I'd had enough. I had to head into Papunya from Mt Liebig as I had some students at Papunya I needed to do some training with at some stage. Took the camera along "just in case".
After visiting the students, I visited the Poo Ponds (as we weird bird-watchers do) and was pleasantly surprised to see among other birds, a Yellow-billed Spoonbill that had been there last week, an Australian Pratincole (which hadn't), 5 Sharp-tailed Sandpipers and one Wood Sandpiper (some of which had been there last week) as well as a number of other birds including a Whiskered Tern. I was contemplating my navel or maybe I was looking at the settings on the camera, can't remember which, when I heard a mad panic among the birds on the ponds. I looked up to see a Brown Falcon had just made a swish at none of them in particular, and followed that all the way to the far side of the ponds from me. Eye up at the eyepiece, my ears were alerted to another panic session in front of me. The Pratincole was piping wildly and the White-necked Heron (hadn't noticed that there - great bird watcher I am) flapped madly as something else zoomed past me. Black Falcon! Oh no! Today of all days, no autofocus, no IS on the lens, oh well. I watched and the Pratincole managed to escape. All three birds then circled high, the Black Falcon the highest until it was just a dot under the clouds.

So, disaster or blessing? I had set the camera to the "M" dial mode. I couldn't move the F stop from 5.6 so I figured that would have to do for the aperture. I had the shutter speed at 1/1600th and the ISO at 800. I also had changed the focus point to the max 19 points rather than a single or extended spot I normally have. OK, all the settings at what I hoped might work and clicked away at the Black Falcon. Below are the results. As to the question, I have often been amazed how some photographers only ever use manual focus for their photos. Maybe not a disaster, but maybe not a blessing either. All these shots are from today.

Black Falcon

Pacific Black Duck

Whiskered Tern

White-necked Heron

Yellow-billed Spoonbill

Sandpipers in flight and on land

I took the following photo recently of 3 different Sandpipers together. Can you name them?

The Sandpipers are at Alice Springs presumably on their way further south for summer, or here until nearly winter. One of our more longer term residents is the Sharp-tailed Sandpiper:

(I think this one was just testing how cold or warm the water was, just a toe in! :0) )

The Common Greenshank is one I re-encountered a few weeks ago at Docker River. Definitive by its high "peep" as it flies, I have included some shots below which show its markings as well.

The Common Sandpiper is one I find fairly easy to identify due to its plain brown colouring and white eyering as per below

I love the iridescent colours of the feathers in the wings of Pacific Black Ducks and how they change depending on the light. You can see the purple on the left hand wing in this photo.

Red-necked Avocets seem to be a very accommodating fly-by bird as can be see by the photo below

Sanderlings, one a bit more mature than the other in the foreground, or perhaps a male and a female, not sure

And finally, a rather pinky/red coloured Yellow-billed Spoonbill. Obviously being playing around in the Central Australian dirt!

Alice Springs to Haasts Bluff stopping at Ellery Creek Big Hole

Spinifex Pigeon

This morning I drove from Alice Springs to Haasts Bluff, stopping at Ellery Creek Big Hole to break the drive. The Spinifex Pigeon above was one of a pair I spotted on the other side of the road from the turnoff. I'd pulled up there not for the Spinnies, but for some other smaller birds, Weebills, that had flown across the road as I pulled back onto the highway. It was unusual to see so many (about 10) so I followed them just off the road and stopped. I then heard a low "Ooomm" from the other side of the car and turned around to see something scurry in between the spinifex grasses. I love these birding moments where you see something totally unexpected.

Below are some more photos of the carpark and waterhole at Ellery Creek Big Hole and more of the Spinifex Pigeons. Hope you enjoy.

Australian Ringneck

Dingo in the carpark at Ellery Creek Big Hole

Pacific Black Ducks "ducking". The Eurasian Coot is not amused

Pied Butcherbird

more Spinifex Pigeon photos