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Monday, 30 September, 2013

 

Today the biggest story is this damn cold I have developed.  My nose ran all day long, and I felt weak and I tired easily.

 

I got to bed by 9 again last night, and I was up at 4:45 this morning.  I slept pretty well, considering the condition of my nose.  I use a CPAP machine when I sleep, for my obstructive sleep apnea, for those readers who don’t know that, and I need to be able to breathe through my nose to sleep.  I did fairly well last night, which was kind of surprising.

 

So, if you will remember, I had a road closure to deal with today.  It was supposed to be closed from 8 AM until 5 PM.  Well, I easily beat that, as I was out of here by 6:05, which is just about a record for me.  I got up to Barren Grounds before 6:30, and I set out on the track to look for Eastern Bristlebird and Ground Parrot, along with other good birds.  Well, I walked the tracks for an hour and a half, and I didn’t get a sausage.  Maybe two or three species, but nothing interesting or useful at all.  I was disappointed, because I had managed to convince myself from what I had read that I had at least a 50-50 chance of the bristlebird, and I’m always optimistic (but skeptical), so I was disappointed when I didn’t get it.  I had it at 60% in my spreadsheet, and I had noted that it responded to playback, which I tried a number of times, even though you aren’t supposed to use playback at Barren Grounds.  Oh well, that is how birding goes, sometimes.

 

Back at the car, I thought I might try for a little bit in the other direction, and suddenly there were some birds.  There were two or three White-throated Treecreepers, but I wasn’t quite able to get a decent picture.  The Fan-tailed Cuckoo was around again, too, and there were calls I couldn’t identify.  I did see a male Golden Whistler, though.  I also saw a small bird that was making a loud call, and I never was able to identify it.  It looked like a thornbill, and it had streaking or striations on its breast.  The only two possibilities, as far as I could see, were Brown Thornbill or Striated Thornbill, but neither one had a call anything like what I was hearing, according to my birding app on my phone.  I see now that both are reported there, and if it weren’t for the call I heard, I would call it a Striated Thornbill, but I don’t feel comfortable doing that.  I ended up seeing that same species, whatever it was, in a couple of other places today, too.  Another birding mystery.

 

Anyway, at that same time, there was a small group of little birds that came through, and they were BEAUTIFUL FIRETAILS, to my pleased surprise.  I knew that was a possibility at Barren Grounds, but I only had them at 40% in my spreadsheet (hoping to see them at Royal National Park, actually), so they made up for missing the bristlebird.  I had only seen a very fleeting glimpse of Beautiful Firetail before, and today I had great looks at them.  I even got a couple of pictures.  Not good pictures, but the birds never stayed still for long.  Here is a picture of one from behind.  I don’t normally show pictures of birds that don’t show their heads, but this shows where the name “firetail” comes from.

 

Here is another picture that shows the facial detail and the horizontal stripes around the body.

 

I “just missed” a number of other shots, and then they flew off on their daily rounds.

 

So, I had at least seen a good one, and I left feeling a little better.  On the drive out, I saw a Brush Bronzewing again, probably the same one I had seen yesterday.  It landed on a branch, and I managed to get some pictures, out of the passenger side car window.  A very handsome bird.

 

To give you an idea what a good sighting this was, out of the 147 reports in the data base I use for Barren Grounds, only 3 of them report seeing Brush Bronzewing.  So, they obviously are pretty rare in the area.

 

I stopped again at the entrance, to try again for Gang-gang Cockatoo, but I didn’t get that one, either.  I did see a Bassian Thrush, though.  That was one I had seen at Royal National Park last Wednesday – an excellent one that I hadn’t expected to see.  Well, today I saw another one, and I even got pictures today.  Bassian Thrush.

 

So, after two and a half hours, I moved on from Barren Grounds.  I stopped at the Budderoo fire trail, but saw nothing there.  My next stop was Carrington Falls.  No birds worth mentioning, but here is a picture of the falls.  It is about 160 feet high.

 

I did get a mediocre picture of a Grey Fantail there.  I see them everywhere, but they usually don’t sit still for pictures.  I’ll keep trying for a better one, but here is a Grey Fantail.

 

After that, I drove through Robertson and took the shortcut to Fitzroy Falls.  I stopped at a place on Fitzroy Reservoir, to look for ducks that supposedly were on the lake sometimes.  Before I got out and looked for ducks, though, I took a 20 minute nap in the car, and I felt better after that.  I was still blowing my nose nonstop, however.

 

I walked down to the lake, and saw a couple of Australasian Grebes, a couple of swans, but nothing interesting.  On the way back to the car, there was a commotion, though, as birds were chasing other birds, and a lot of squawking was going on.  I eventually figured out that several Noisy Miners were chasing two or three NOISY FRIARBIRDS around, and both species were living up to their names, by being quite noisy.  I tried for pictures of the friarbirds, but the miners never let them sit still long enough for me to get a picture.  I’m sure I’ll see more Noisy Friarbirds, and I’ll see if I can get pictures then.  Still, it was another one for my trip list.

 

Around on the other side of the lake, I pulled in to the picnic area near Fitzroy Falls.  I scanned the lake with my binoculars, and I picked up a single GREAT CRESTED GREBE for my trip list.  There was a terrific racket going on in the trees, sounding like insects.  My next stop was the Fitzroy Falls visitor center, and I asked there about the insect noise.  I was told they are cicadas, and they erupt like this every ten years, and this was the year for this area.  I saw some dead ones on the ground, and they are pretty large insects, maybe an inch and a half long.  The mature ones have wings.  They sure do make a racket, though.

 

I walked to the lookout for Fitzroy Falls, along with all the families and little kids.  This is school holidays, you might remember.  Here is a picture of the falls, from the lookout, which is right next to the top of the falls.

 

I ate my humble lunch there at a table, and then moved on.  I would have liked to have gone back the way I had come, and stopped at Barren Grounds again, to try again for some of the special birds there, but the road closure stopped me.  I could have hung around until after 5 PM, when the road was supposed to open again, but I was feeling very tired by that time, and I just didn’t want to push myself that much.  So I took the route through Kangaroo Valley and Berry, stopping in Kiama when I got there.  Along the way, I did add my fourth species of the day, CATTLE EGRET.  Cattle Egret is one of the species I have seen in the USA, Britain, and also Australia.  Others that come to mind are House Sparrow, European Starling, and Feral Pigeon.  Those three are all introduced birds, all native to Europe, but as far as I know, Cattle Egrets spread themselves naturally, without the help of man.

 

I looked for Pacific Gull in the Kiama harbor, but came up empty on that one.  I did see a White-faced Heron on the rocks there, and since I haven’t shown a picture of one yet, and they are an attractive bird, here is a White-faced Heron.

 

So, after that, I stopped at a Subway in Kiama and got a footlong tuna sandwich for my dinner, and then I stopped once more at Spring Creek Reserve, for a last shot at Common Blackbird and European Goldfinch.  I missed both of those, and I won’t see them anywhere else I will go on the trip, either.  That is one of the interesting aspects of a birding trip that covers a lot of territory.  As you move along, you leave the areas where some species live, and they become impossible to see.  You can never see them all.  Here in the greater Sydney area, I have seen some species I didn’t’ expect to see, and I missed others that I had expected.  When I get some time, I will update my spreadsheet, but until I do that, I don’t really know how I’m doing.

 

I got back here to my room about 4:15, and I had a little rest to recharge my batteries.  Then I got online and started the evening routines – processing pictures, checking email, writing this report, having my drinkies, and having my humble dinner.  No time for anything else.

 

So, it was a disappointing birding day today, because I missed several possibilities at Barren Grounds.  I did manage to add four species to my trip list, though, so now I am at 98 species total, of which 2 are lifers.

 

Tomorrow I head “out west”, as the Aussies call it.  I plan to travel over the Great Dividing Range, which is the Blue Mountains here.  On the other side of the Great Dividing Range, the rivers dump into the ocean south of Australia or west of Australia, rather than into the ocean on the east side.  It is like our Rocky Mountains in that respect, but it always seems odd to me that the Great Dividing Range here is only about 50 or 100 miles from the East Coast, when the country is over 2000 miles across.

 

Anyway, tomorrow is one of the longer drives of the trip for me, about 4 and a half hours driving time.  I have a number of places I would like to stop on the way, and I’ll have to pick and choose which ones to stop at.  I’ll have to see how I feel, too, and see how long I can drive at a time without taking a little nap.  I’m going to the Capertee Valley, which is very rural.  The closest gas station or store will be over an hour away from where I am staying.  I am staying on a farm, in a one-bedroom cottage.  I will have a full kitchen, so I will stock up with groceries tomorrow on the way there.  I’ll be there three nights.  I don’t know what my internet situation will be.  I’m hoping I can access the internet for my laptop via my cellphone, but that theory is yet to be tested, and I don’t know how good the mobile phone coverage is going to be out there.  At best, I expect it to be marginal.  It might not be good enough for me to get on at all.  Another possibility is that I might be able to use my hosts’ internet connection to send out my reports and check my email.  We will see.  It is possible that I won’t be able to post anything more after this for two or even three days.  So, if you don’t get a report tomorrow, don’t worry about me.  It will come through eventually.