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Myself and Graham Turner yesterday (3/1/04) did our
first birding for 2004 with the hope of finding some new birds for the
year.
We spent about half an hour at The Entrance in the
NSW Central Coast (approx. 100km north of Sydney CBD) where we watched for most
of that time, what we presume to be the South Island Pied
Oystercatcher/Australian Pied Oystercatcher (SIPO/OZPO) hybrid seen by others.
It's legs being a third shorter than the OZPO (the later seen quite close by
throughout the observation) was very obvious but not so its white wing
stripe along the bottom edge of the folded wing (the photos taken by Tony
Palliser of the SIPO that was seen in the northern NSW coast clearly
shows this feature and it is also shown in the Morcombe field guide). We later
saw the hybrid PO then fly and land within a few metres from the OZPO and
clearly saw the leg size differences again, that
the white wing bar of the hybrid PO did not meet the trailing edge of the
upperwing and that its underwing was much the same of a normal OZPO with white
confined only to the underwing coverts and all flight feather being black (as
shown in the Hayman, Marchant & Prater; Morcombe field guides and one
of Tony Palliser's photos). The hybrid PO's bill was quite thin when viewed
front on. So if this is a hybrid (?) do I get half a tick?
Along a nearby Sandspit (close to Karagi
Pt), there were about 100 Little Terns and a few Common Terns with them,
however as we wanted to press on to the next stop sooner rather than later, we
really did not give it a good enough look at these birds (the
Terns) than what they deserve.
We made it at the Stockton high tide wader roost
below Stockton Bridge (approx. 195 km north of Sydney CBD) just as the
birds were starting to disperse to the adjacent mud flats were we looked
carefully at all the waders, in particular, the more smaller ones and after a
while, we located 2 Broad-billed Sandpipers feeding close by with
Sharp-tailed, Curlew and Terek Sandpipers. Thier double (Snipe like)
eye-brow marks were obvious and well as their long straight broad bills
(especially when viewed front on) down-curved at the tip, short legs and dark
carpal marks and were of course much smaller than the other waders just
mentioned (all these features were easy to pick through our
scopes).
At the time we were there we also counted
approx. 5 Red-necked Stints; 300 plus Sharp-tailed, 200 plus Curlew and 16 Terek
Sandpipers; 4 Grey-tailed Tattlers; 20 Red and 2 Great Knots; 300 plus
Bar-tailed and 60 plus Black-tailed Godwits; 1 Whimbrel; 60 Eastern Curlews; 400
plus Red-necked Avocets; a Pied Stilt and 3 Pied Oystercatchers. As we did not
arrive there at peak high tide, we missed on the waders that had
already dispersed further afield on the mud flats (as seen at a
distance), and the numbers of waders I have just mentioned are only a
very small fraction of what I have seen here in previous
years.
Both Brown Honeyeaters and Mangrove Gerygones were
heard behind the roost at Stockton.
A short visit to Ash Island produced little in the
way of waders but we did see a pair of several Red-capped Plovers with a chick,
White-fronted Chats and good looks of a Mangrove Gerygone.
Before heading home at around mid-afternoon,
we stopped at Lenaghan and saw 4 Wandering Whistling-ducks, 7 Plumed Egrets
feeding together in a small swamp with some Cattle Egrets, c 80 Hardheads and 2
Australasian Shovelers.
Edwin Vella
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