At Kellys swamp yesterday,
saw
Australian Shellduck. I
am pretty certain they are two juveniles as identified by the
following features. 2 Large birds, smaller one (female) had white stripe at base
of beak, very pale white eye ring, both had white neck band, large white
shoulder patches, green wing patches, black beaks, very dark brown heads,
smaller bird had clearly buff/chestnut breast. The only other possibilities I
could think of were mallard crosses, but the beak, green wing patch, beak base
stripe should rule this out. Both birds were at the very south of Kellys
swamp dabbling/grazing in shallow water and I got reasonable views. Great to see
them, thanks to Steve Holliday. I
haven't seen them for a while.
Also saw 3 sandpiper shaped birds
but wasn't close enough.
Watched 2 Latham's snipe feeding
together, then a separate bird feeding alone, over half an hour. The latter
probed its beak to the base into some grass mounds.
2 Royal spoonbills. On dusk 2-3
night herons flew in. No rails or crakes or
freckled ducks.
The pelicans 'calling' reminded
me of hippopotamus calls and I could imagine I was in Africa again. At Batemans Bay
the pelicans sit on light poles, why don't they in Canberra, especially next
to the lake?
Also think I caught a glimpse of
the very rare, yet omnipresent, vagrant, Geoffrey Dabbler, or is it Geoffrey's
Dabbler.
Benj
