Grubby corellas & Middle Lagoon miscellany

Here's a final selection of photos from our time at Middle Lagoon in August 2012. I have never seen corellas look so grubby!

Little corella

Grey-crowned babbler

Little friarbird admires the sunrise

Little friarbird (left) and Diamond dove

Yellow silvereye in the mangroves

Also seen readily in the mangroves was Broad-billed flycatcher (above and below)

I reckon I had a great shot of the male Mangrove golden whistler but there was no card in the camera AAARRgh! I went back for it but only found the female.

Why did the Long-tailed finch cross the road?

Singing honeyeater (above) and Brown honeyeater (below) were the predominant smaller honeyeaters at the time

Bird on!

Middle Lagoon 2 - Birds of the skies

Just around the headland of Middle Lagoon is a second small bay. This view shows the beach at low tide and the ridge available for camping. While we were camped there the small headland was used as a perch by one of my (well, everyone's) favourite birds, the Brahminy kite. It was tricky to get close but I managed it once.

 

The Brahminy was just one good reason to keep an eye on the sky. We were thrilled to have distant views of what to us was a striking but immediately unfamiliar bird - Lesser frigatebird.

 

 

One morning I was alerted to the sound of a sizeable flock of Red-tailed blacks on the move. Only one week before our arrival there had been a bushfire. Now there was smoke in the air again and cockies on the move. They were moving in fits and starts, advancing 100m or so then landing in trees, perhaps picking up birds that had perched there. They became a group of 60 to 80 birds -  certainly more RTBs than I had ever seen together before and I hurriedly grabbed gear and tried to find myself in their path!

 

This was difficult and I wondered at my foolishness given the smoke in the air!!

Unfortunately no good shots resulted but I had another memorable Middle Lagoon experience!

Bird on!

 

Middle Lagoon 1 - Birds of the water's edge

We enjoyed almost a week at Middle Lagoon on the Dampier Peninsula north of Broome. Now, I'm absolutely out of my depth when it comes to waders so be ready for a few clangers!

Firstly though I had heard calls and had initial glimpses through mangroves of what I thought was going to be Striated heron. Wasn't I pleased when this bird finally made an obvious appearance and raised it's eyebrow back at me?

Striated heron, 21 August 2012

I feel a little nervous asserting that we see above (clockwise from top-left) Gull-billed tern, Greater sand-plover, Red-capped plover and Common sandpiper enjoying the tidal flats.

Pied oystercatcher, Middle Lagoon 

Eastern reef egret (grey morph)

Having perched myself among the rocks to watch this egret I was treated to very close views as it hunted (quite productively!) in the shallows. In the fading Indian Ocean sunset the bird came closer and closer to where I was sitting before moving on to another hunting ground. 

Speaking of putting on a show these Brown booby were not to be outdone:

Going .....

Going .....

Gone!

Loved this place!

Bird on!