As a birder KI was certainly a great place to be. The other travelling families, bless 'em, insisted they didn't mind the convoy being halted while Pete checked out something that "might be new"! As usual the jewels in the crown were not easy to find (dips on glossy black cockatoo & diamond firetail for example) but a lot of birds I don't see much were really "in your face".
One place I returned to was Duck Lagoon - only about 11km from Kingscote. The 1st solo outing was nearly short-lived due to the size & voraciousness of the mozzies. It was saved by the discovery of the Aerogard Kath had planted in the "in-car picnic box" - what a woman!
I was hoping to tick Yellow-billed spoonbill at Duck Lagoon but dipped on this first visit (an evening). I had childhood memories of seeing yellow-billeds at farm-dams etc. The return trip was at dawn revealing the spoonbills roosting in trees which was a little surprise for this nuff-nuff!
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| Duck Lagoon - the white specks are roosting spoonbills |
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| Restless Flycatcher |
Even with a borrowed scope, Murray Lagoon was altogether uninspiring, visually & birdially.
But it was good to get up close & personal to lots of old favourites:
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| Scarlet robin |
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| That $#@! trophy belongs IN VICTORIA!!! |
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| "Hmmm, wonder what's on?" |
Lifers included the following:
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| Purple-crowned lorikeet |
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| Crescent Honeyeater - this one trying to feed on honeycomb at Crawford's Honey Farm |
And we are also very relieved to be able to post pictures of our namesake ....
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| Go TURNSTONES! |
Love it! BTW, trophy looks at home in the NT! Crescent Honeyeater shot is wonderful. And scoping! What is going on? (Was it the type with the in-built camera? And the Turnstones ... did you have to crop the photo to get just 5 in it? Is the angry one Uncle Pete?
ReplyDeleteOptically, this particular scope was a definite 3rd place behind:
ReplyDelete1. binoculars
2. naked eye.