Return of the Black-breasted Buzzard pair from last year

Last year I watched a pair of Black-breasted Buzzards nest, mate and then raise a chick until almost a fledgling. Sadly, the young one (I think) fell out of the nest, possibly during a fairly windy, violent storm, and I'm fairly certain didn't make it.

The pair has returned to the same nest to try again. I'm hoping they are more experienced and have better luck.

Currently they are sitting (I am presuming) on egg(s). The male was doing the majority of the sitting while I was there recently, with the female preening, chasing off Whistling Kites and being harassed by the nearby Brown Goshawk neighbours when she flew a bit close to them mating.

I managed to get a few shots of the pair as per below. Hopefully as the year continues I'll be able to post some shots of a chick or two and then some fledged young.

Black-breasted Buzzard

The weather is warming up, birds are nesting and maybe rains are coming

In the past few days I have noticed the reptiles have started to re-appear after the colder winter months. The Bearded Dragon (above and below) is one of the more obvious species as they have been appearing on the top of posts, tops of trees and on the roads.

Another species I have seen a few times now is the Centralian Blue-tongue. This can be very colourful even though the one below isn't showing all the colours and it was taken late in the afternoon.

The birds seem to be actively building nests which makes me wonder if we are perhaps not getting rain in the Centre soon. Some, like the Black-shouldered Kite have made sure they are ready by hatching chicks early. You can just see the heads in the third photo of the chicks in the nest.

The smaller birds are the ones who are most actively building nests. The Thornbills below were actively foraging for nesting material, and there are lots of nests in trees and shrubs around Alice Springs and even more out of town.

Yellow-rumped Thornbill

Inland Thornbill

Look who has babies - Crimson Chats

Yesterday I had stopped at one of my favourite stops on the highway north of Alice Springs. I always love birds with colour and had a lovely 15 minutes of watching Budgerigars, Cockatiels, Mulga Parrots, Australian Ringnecks as well as Zebra Finches, Rufous Songlarks and White-plumed Honeyeaters flit around the tree tops and coming to drink in a large puddle underneath the highway. As I was heading out I saw another of my favourite coloured birds, the Crimson Chat. I stopped the car and hoped the male would come nearby. With striking splashes of red on their head and underside, a beautiful white "bib" under their chin and black/grey wings, tail feathers and up around the eye, I find them delightful to look at and photograph. The female although not quite as striking, still has dabbles of red on their undersides and a big dollop on their rump, and although a plainer brown for the rest of the body, has the same striking white-ish eye with the black pupil. I watched a pair of them flit around catching small grubs and insects within 5 metres of the car. and then I noticed they were heading to the same bush, ferreting around and then heading off again, only to return a few minutes later. Even though it would be obvious to most observers that birds have been nesting for a little while already due to the recent rains, it took me a few minutes to realise they were actually returning to a nest. I kept watching waiting for them to bring nesting material, but the grubs and insects seemed to be the only thing they were getting and finally it dawned on me that they were actually feeding a baby. At one point neither of them were in sight so I snuck out of the car with the camera and took a peek inside the shrub in question. One obvious head stuck out, bright orange and mouth wide open. I could see another egg, and thought there may have been another hatched baby. Two definites and possibly a third. The hatched one or two must have only hatched yesterday, as there were no feathers, just those huge ET like eyes and head and a brown shrivelled skin looking body. If I can manage it I'll try to get back there over the next few days to see if there are two or three, and see how quickly they change.

I was at the nest for about 20 seconds, and realised I had been there too long as the mum returned and did a strange dance, acting as though it was injured with one wing out, crawling along the ground, obviously trying to turn my attention away from the nest. I got back in the car and continued to watch, hoping the two adult birds would return and my quick peek inside the nest hadn't disturbed their family life. Happily, the adults did return, and the male hawked the ground between the nest and the car for insects giving great opportunities for some photos. I hope this isn't the last nest I'll get to see in the coming weeks.

Crimson Chat

Adult Male

Adult Female

Babies in the nest

The nest with parents on either side

The nest with parents dad looking into the nest, mum to the right