Steve, as noted in my email of 14 Feb I had a flock of 27 Red Wattlebird heading over my garden flying north-west about 10 days ago now and no RW in the garden since then.
Sad to find a beautiful specimen of a juvenile Sacred Kingfisher on the front garden today. Obviously a window casualty but glad that the ANWC will take the carcase.
Chris
From: Steve
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Sent: Sunday, February 16, 2020 5:10 PM
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Subject: [canberrabirds] ANBG today
I wandered through the Australian National Botanic Gardens this morning – full bird-list at
ebird.org/australia/checklist/S64550995. Small birds (White-browed Scrub-wren &c) were active, but unusually I saw no Red Wattlebirds and only heard a brief call from one. On previous visits of similar
length over the last 12 months I have seen or heard 15, 6, 15, 22, 10, 6. 3, 7, 8, 5 and 12.
Have others noticed a marked exodus of Red Wattlebirds from particular areas this summer, or a relative paucity of Red Wattlebirds from the ANBG currently?
The gardens looked better than expected after the hailstorm. I suspect a major clean-up was undertaken. Many of the eucalypt stands had lost much of their canopy, but regeneration had already started. A few trunks in the upper parts of
the gardens showed scars from individual hailstones, but this phenomenon was not as marked as higher up Black Mountain.
Regards
Steve
