Dave and Kathy Cook, Prue and I had an interesting morning for our first woodland survey of the year. The day started cold and grey, with a quite heavy pall of smoke. The birds responded accordingly – we saw little during our first few counts, even at normally productive sites. Fortunately things then picked up and we managed to find some quite unusual species for the reserve amongst the 44 species we eventually recorded (33 during point counts).
Notable were a roosting Tawny Frogmouth (a first for the surveys) spotted by Kathy at site 6, 2 Southern Whitefaces, the first for a considerable time, between sites 1 and 3, male and female Rose Robins at site 2, also at site 2 a couple of White-throated Treecreepers, not often found in the southern half of Gooroo. At least 20 Grey Fantails were at site 7, associating with good numbers of Silvereyes and Spotted and Striated Pardalotes. Black-faced Cuckoo-shrikes were prominent with up to 8 at one site. There were very few other summer migrants noted – just a couple of Rufous Whistlers and a juvenile White-throated Gerygone. Winter birds included Scarlet Robins heard at several sites and a few Golden Whistlers and White-eared Honeyeaters. Amongst other sightings were singles of Speckled Warbler, Common Bronzewing, Brown Falcon, Wedge-tailed Eagle and a couple of Mistletoebirds.
Steve
