Last night I went to Waniassa Hills PS to see if I could find the Musk Lorikeet reported there by Christine the previous evening. I did at least
find a treefull of Rainbow Lorikeets about a block away from the schoolground, and was about to give up when a lot of things that looked (in silhouette) like slim-winged, overgrown Swallows zoomed overhead going NW. Luckily more kept coming until I collected
my wits and could see through the binoculars that they had bright white rumps. Just as exciting as a Musk Lorikeet! Fork-tailed (or Pacific) Swifts weren’t even on my radar as something to look out for! They are now though, so next time I’ll try to count them
as well and look out for needletails.
Cheers,
Sue
From: Philip Veerman [
Sent: Wednesday, 24 January 2018 8:23 PM
To: 'Tony and Tash Manderson' <>; 'canberrabirds chatline' <>
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] Pacific swift me too
Thanks for that. I went outside at 5:30 today to try to find the Dollarbird family again (I saw 2 of them yesterday evening and have been hearing them at 5:40 in
the mornings, but suspect the whole family is still present). Also to confirm the flock of Yellow Thornbills at the local park. I happened to look up at the right time and saw (I believe 5, could be 4 or 6) Pacific Swift fly over, pretty much above my house.
ID by very long pointed tails, completely dark underneath, very slender in wings and body and tail, more so than the needletails. I admire anyone’s ability to photograph them. They were going very fast, fairly straight, in a SW direction, no chance at a second
look. Maybe this is only my third GBS Record for the species in 32 years.
Philip
From: Tony and Tash Manderson
Sent: Wednesday, 24 January, 2018 4:33 PM
To: canberrabirds chatline
Subject: [canberrabirds] Pacific swift
Hi all,
Was nice to see a few Pacific Swift around the zoo today. I see Alistair Smith also observed a larger flock at Jerra over the weekend. No WTN though.
Some poor photos in the checklist. http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S42191418
Regards
Liam Manderson
