birding-aus

French Island (Vict.) trip - Rams Island 10 Aug '02

To:
Subject: French Island (Vict.) trip - Rams Island 10 Aug '02
From:
Date: Mon, 12 Aug 2002 09:17:56 +1000

From: Martin  on 12/08/2002 09:17 AM


To:   
cc:   Martin 
Subject:  French Island (Vict.) trip - Rams Island 10 Aug '02

The Friends of French Island had another successful outing on Saturday 10
August.  This time for our annual checking of the shell-grit situation and
weeding of the little Rams Island for tern breeding.

The tide was coming in and we arrived on the southern shores of French Island
(with parks Victoria support) to the site of a few hundred waders busily
foraging on the beach between hide tide mark and Rams Island a few hundred
metres out.  To many people's surprise, including a regular Western Port wader
survey participant (Betty Mitchell), we observed some Red and Great Knots with a
few Red Knot in superb breeding plumage with rusty-red fronts.  In addition,
some of the knots had yellow leg-flags and we saw a number of orange-flagged
waders as well.

Species observed were:
Double-banded Plover ~100
Great Knot 2
Red Knot 52 (at least two in breeding plumage)
Curlew-Sandpiper ~150
Red-necked Stint ~200
Turnstone 7 (most in breeding plumage)
Eastern Curlew 1
Red-capped plover 2
Pied Oystercatcher 2

I understand knots are infrequently recorded in Western Port Bay so these
observations are interesting.  Great to come across a mixed flock of
overwintering waders so close to Melbourne.

Can anyone advise me of the status of yellow-flagged birds in Victoria.  Are
they birds flagged in Western Australia?

cheers, Martin



Martin O'Brien
Executive Scientific Officer, Scientific Advisory Committee
Department of Natural Resources and Environment
4/250 Victoria Pde., East Melbourne  3002

Tel: 9412 4567  Fax: 9412 4586
(prefixes: Interstate 03 International 613)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Birding-Aus is on the Web at
www.shc.melb.catholic.edu.au/home/birding/index.html
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message
"unsubscribe birding-aus" (no quotes, no Subject line)
to 


<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>
Admin

The University of NSW School of Computer and Engineering takes no responsibility for the contents of this archive. It is purely a compilation of material sent by many people to the birding-aus mailing list. It has not been checked for accuracy nor its content verified in any way. If you wish to get material removed from the archive or have other queries about the archive e-mail Andrew Taylor at this address: andrewt@cse.unsw.EDU.AU