Louise and I went to Pourmalong Swamp west of Newcastle today (Jan 1st)
after receiving excellent directions from Richard Baxter (Thanks Richard).
We met Robert Quinan who was already there and easily found a male Painted
Snipe feeding out on the open mud (Robert had seen it in the same location
on the previous day). We were then met by Graham O'Connor who had just found
a Little Bittern close by, but we did not relocate it. The four of us then
drove over to Ash Island to look for Yellow Wagtails (unsuccessfully), but
we were rewarded with stunning close views of a Pectoral Sandpiper. It was
with several Sharpies which gave a terrific opportunity to study all the
structural differences. A memorable morning's birding!
The Painted Snipe was seen by me at 09.30am EDT on 01-01-01 and became the
678th bird on my Aussie list. Can I therefore claim the first Australian
'tick' in the New Millenium ?? (For those of us that do not believe the
calendar started in Year 0)
Cheers
Roger McGovern
Birding-Aus is on the Web at
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