By the hamlet of Dirranbandi Q., location of that rollicking
early Hugh Jackman movie ‘Paperback Hero’, flows the Narran
River. This is an intermittent distributary of the Condamine/Balonne
which eventually feeds Narran Lake far to the south-west in NSW. In an
exceptional year the Narran might, on the way, fill Angledool Lake, which in
turn outflows into Weetalibah Creek, which (historically about every 10 years)
might reach ‘Coocoran Lake’, about 12 km west of Lightning Ridge,
on the other side of the highway. However, given present conditions,
Coocoran Lake might never again be more than a lake in name. The vicinity
of Coocoran Lake was where I spent 5 days of this trip.
On the second morning I was by the shearing shed trying to photograph
flying Crested Pigeons for Rob Magrath when
this came along. Flight was direct but buoyant, giving the impression of
a large grey, non-hovering kestrel:
With the almost daily sightings at Bowra, I now have the
impression that much of inland Australia is awash with Grey Falcons. I
wait for someone to reinforce that impression with a more rigorous survey
The property I was staying at was
of comparable size to Bowra with extensive tracts of interesting veg, although
not much Mulga. As at Bowra it took a bit of work to cover it all,
particularly as the birds are really only active early morning and late
afternoon. By using a network of farm tracks and opal mining roads,
all the birds one might expect could be found tucked away somewhere, including
these 3 favourites. Of course all 3 can be found within a 4-hour drive to
the west of Canberra, but you wouldn’t see as much opal mining, and the
chances of seeing Hugh Jackman, nowhere very high these days, would be rather
less.
