G'day Twitchathon Fans,
Our team was comprised of all first time 'thoners,
Neville and Marj Pamment, Jim Caine and myself. We all
share a keen interest in urban birding. Neville and
Marj have a good knowledge of the lower Merri
Creek/Studley Park area, Jim the Maribyrnong and the
Altona/Williamstown areas. And me - wherever the Puny
Twitch has taken me. Coincidently, we all met (apart
from Neville and Marj of course) via Birding-aus.
Originally we intended to stick to my Puny Twitch
area, but decided to extend that to within about 15km
of the CBD in order to include more waders and shore
birds. It didn't matter that we had no chance of
winning. All we wanted was a great day's birding in
good company, with as little travel as possible - we
are 'The Cheep Trills'. All of this as well as raising
some money for bird conservation can't be bad thing!
We fortified ourselves for the 'rigours' ahead by
enjoying a scrumptious breakfast whilst looking out on
the Pamment's garden, waiting for a Tree Sparrow to
appear. It never did, but that didn't seem to matter
with eggs and bacon (with all the trimmings) to enjoy.
Neville then led us around some of his favourite
haunts in the Clifton Hill/Fairfield area and we soon
had quite a respectable list. Birds included Darter,
Nankeen Night Heron (3 in the same tree), Dusky
Woodswallow and Yellow Thornbill. An Australian Hobby
also zipped past which meant we could now drop a
planned detour to Parkville where we had intended to
tick it.
>From the east to the west - we journeyed to the
Altona\Williamstown areas stopping at several sites
along the bay. As other teams have reported the wind
was, what shall we say, - bracing! But at least the
forecast rain wasn't materialising. Best birds for
this area included Striated Fieldwren, Australasian
Shoveler, Great Crested Grebe, Royal Spoonbill, Curlew
Sandpiper, Little Egret (only a few metres away - my
best view ever), Caspian and Whiskered Terns.
A leisurely trip via the Ring Road found us at the
Moonstone Walk ponds, near Latrobe Uni, to pick up the
Blue-billed Duck. Unfortunately, there was no sign of
the Little Bittern but Cattle Egret in a nearby
reserve was a real bonus.
Next stop was Banyule Wetlands, then on to finish at
Chelmsworth Reserve - both on the Yarra River. The
main pond at Banyule was a bit disappointing but the
river walks were very productive. Best ticks being
Crested Shrike-tit, Grey Currawong, Olive-backed
Oriole, Sacred Kingfisher and best bird for the day -
Azure Kingfisher. Biggest dips for the day were
Black-faced Cuckoo-shrike, White-faced Heron, European
Goldfinch and Great Cormorant.
Congratulations to the winning teams. Thanks to Jim
for being the chauffeur and Neville and Marj for the
lovely breakfast. And a special thanks to all those
involved in running such a fantastic event.
Total for the day was 94. With such a gruelling
schedule we were all feeling the pace after the 8
hours and looking forward to the finish line barbeque.
I think next year, with a bit of creative thinking and
a slight change in itinerary, we should be able to top
100 and still have time to stop for lunch at one of
those nice cafés in Williamstown. Only joking!
(Maybe!)
Cheers,
Alan Flack
1. Blue-billed Duck
2. Black Swan
3. Australian Wood duck
4. Mallard
5. Pacific Black duck
6. Australasian Shoveler
7. Grey Teal
8. Chestnut Teal
9. Hardhead
10. Australasian Grebe
11. Hoary-headed Grebe
12. Great Crested Grebe
13. Darter
14. Little Pied Cormorant
15. Pied Cormorant
16. Little Black Cormorant
17. Australian Pelican
18. Little Egret
19. Great Egret
20. Cattle Egret
21. Nankeen Night heron
22. Australian White Ibis
23. Royal Spoonbill
24. Brown Goshawk
25. Australian Hobby
26. Nankeen Kestrel
27. Purple Swamphen
28. Dusky Moorhen
29. Eurasian Coot
30. Common Greenshank
31. Red-necked Stint
32. Sharp-tailed Sandpiper
33. Curlew Sandpiper
34. Black-winged Stilt
35. Red-kneed Dotterel
36. Masked Lapwing
37. Pacific Gull
38. Silver Gull
39. Caspian Tern
40. Crested Tern
41. Whiskered Tern
42. Rock Dove
43. Spotted Turtle-dove
44. Crested Pigeon
45. Galah
46. Sulphur-crested Cockatoo
47. Rainbow Lorikeet
48. Eastern Rosella
49. Red-rumped Parrot
50. Azure Kingfisher
51. Laughing Kookaburra
52. Sacred Kingfisher
53. Superb Fairy Wren
54. Spotted Pardalote
55. White browed Scrubwren
56. Striated Fieldwren
57. Brown Thornbill
58. Yellow-rumped Thornbill
59. Yellow Thornbill
60. Red Wattlebird
61. Little Wattlebird
62. Bell Miner
63. Noisy Miner
64. Singing Honeyeater
65. White-plumed Honeyeater
66. New Holland Honeyeater
67. White-fronted Chat
68. Eastern Yellow Robin
69. Crested Shrike-tit
70. Golden Whistler
71. Rufous Whistler
72. Grey Shrike-thrush
73. Magpie-lark
74. Grey Fantail
75. Willie Wagtail
76. Olive-backed Oriole
77. Dusky Woodswallow
78. Pied Butcherbird
79. Australian Magpie
80. Grey Currawong
81. Little Raven
82. Skylark
83. House Sparrow
84. Red-browed Finch
85. European Greenfinch
86. Welcome Swallow
87. Fairy Martin
88. Clamorous Reed-Warbler
89. Little Grassbird
90. Golden-headed Cisticola
91. Silvereye
92. Common Blackbird
93. Common Starling
94. Common Myna.
List prepared by Jim Caine 28/10/2003
http://search.yahoo.com.au - Yahoo! Search
- Looking for more? Try the new Yahoo! Search
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
|
