G’day Martin,
What did you get on your worst site? This morning (Sunday) I did three of the grassland sites near Gungahlin. On the second site I recorded a big fat Zilch, Zero, NIL, Nought and no birds even, and on the last of the three, after 10 minutes, a pipit decided to land on a fence post. It is very frustrating hearing and seeing things like cisticolas just outside the survey area.
Yesterday I did 5 urban wetlands, 2 sites near Kaleen and 4 sites around Hall at one of which I ran into Terry Bell just starting his survey as I was finishing. It will be interesting to see how we compare with our bird lists. Quite a few breeding records but nothing terribly special – best bird was a Brown Quail at the Flemington Road wetland.
Off to do a couple more sites before my arthritic ankles finally give out for the day.
Mark
From: Martin Butterfield [
Sent: Saturday, 26 October 2013 9:05 PM
To: COG List
Subject: [canberrabirds] Blitz report
I covered 7 sites around Kowen Forest this morning. My overall total was 43 species with 5 breeding records. (Rufous Whistler DIsplay); White-browed Scrubwren (Carrying Food); White-wnged Chough (Nest with Young); Common Starling (Nest with Young); Australian Raven (Carrying Food - in that case it appeared to be half a ham sandwich stolen from some railway workers)
The best site was a heavily grazed paddock opposite the Defence HQ which had 20+ White-browed Woodswallow,. 5 Masked Woodswallow, 5 Dusky Woodswallow 3 White-winged Trillers and a pair of Scarlet Robins. The worst site was on the back of Sparrow Hill which has been clear-felled with extreme prejudice and replanted .... to Pinus radiata!!!!
Other extra-good sightings were a Jacky Winter and Speckled Warbler.
I didn't count the Brown Goshawk which nearly took my helmet off at Kowen Pound as a breeding record.
A few images of birds and other stuff I noticed are on my blog.
--
Martin Butterfield
