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The undoubted highlight of the Chapman bird scene
on our arrival back has been the sighting of 12 southern whiteface this
morning. They were flushed at first but then sat quietly in 2 briar bushes
next to the SW track on Cooleman Ridge, close to where they were recorded
breeding in 2004. A lone diamond firetail was in an adjoining
briar.
Another pair seem to have taken up residence near
the big dam on the edge of the old Narrabundah pine forest/Chapman horse
paddocks, at least 2 km away. This is certainly the most I've seen in this
area, if not anywhere, amazing for a species that I can't recall recording
pre-fires.
Another surprise was a flock of about 80 corellas
low over the house yesterday. I'm assuming most, if not all, were little
corellas, it's always very difficult to identify the long-billed on the
wing. For the 3rd year in a row there seems to be a trend of corellas
being common in the 2nd half of the year, and scarce in the first
half.
Lots of red-rumped parrots still around, which is
unusual as numbers are usually pretty low in winter. On the other
hand flame robins have been hard to find, though we did see up to 9
including 3 males on our walk this morning.
Jack
Holland
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