Hi All,
I went to Tidbinbilla yesterday to show an overseas colleague the Kangaroos, Emus, and Rock-Wallabies. The birding highlight was a fantastic display put on by a displaying Swamp Harrier over the reedbeds at the southern end of the Santuary. For five minutes it called continuously whilst circling around the reedbeds at a height of about 25m interspersed with rolling dives and climbs, steeper closed wing dives, and briefly flipping over onto its back. Basically a fantastic show. A rather pale Brown Falcon then moved into the area and the Harrier spent the next five minutes repeatedly chasing the Falcon from perch to perch. However, as we were leaving the tables seemed to have turned as the Brown Falcon now seemed to be harrying the harrier (sorry, couldn't help it). The Swamp Harrier was a pretty rufous individual - a trait usually considered to be typical of females but I am never 100% sure with this really variable species. It could be worth keeping an eye out in this area as it seems a little unusual for a Harrier to be displaying so vigourously without a pair being present. Although Harriers will start to display mid-late winter into early spring it does also seem quite early in the year to see this sort of display.
Other nice birds included several small flocks (5-6 birds) of Brown-headed Honeyeaters around the Santuary and 80+ Red-browed Finches feeding on the seeding grasses/weeds on the drying pond at the northern end of the Sanctuary. A Spotless Crake on the small reed-filled dam at the ?Flints Picnic Area was another bonus.
This morning Narrabundah Hill (the horse paddock end - Duffy) was going off in the rain with a fantastic mixed feeding flock including over 30 Diamond Firetail, 3 Southern White-face, 8 Flame Robin, 3 Scarlet Robin, 2 Australian Pipit, and the usual thornbills and Weebills. 2 Grey Currawong were showing well and calling from the exposed tree tops - not a species I have seen on this part of Narrabundah Hill before. There were also 5 Brown Quail along the track bordering the horse paddocks (about 300m past the main dam). There were also Stubble Quail in this rough area earlier in the week.
Cheers Dan
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