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birding-aus Occasional Cairns News

To: " edu. au" <>
Subject: birding-aus Occasional Cairns News
From: "Keith and Lindsay Fisher" <>
Date: Fri, 22 Oct 1999 19:35:38 +1000
Hi everyone,
A pair of Beach Stone-curlew at the Cairns airport hatched out a chick on the 
15th Oct., that was 22
days since I first saw it on the nest (which is at least 2km from the nearest 
beach).  As I was away
for 10 days I missed the exact time they started sitting so I am unable to give 
an incubation
period. They were sitting before I went away but I was unable to see an egg. 
The chick and parents
were still within 10m of the nest yesterday 21st Oct. Interestingly a Masked 
Lapwing is sitting on 4
eggs about 30m away in the same area. Waders generally seem slow coming through 
this year, not many
Sharp-tails, only a couple of Curlew sands., small flocks of Red-necked Stints 
(around 200), not
many Eastern Curlews, Bar-tailed Godwits, Pacific Golden Plover (13), 3 Marsh 
Sandpipers turned up
at Cairns airport a week ago, Lesser Sandplovers or Greater Sandplovers. A 
couple of Broadbilled
Sandpipers have been seen.

Other migrants to have put in an appearance are Black-faced Monarchs 2 weeks 
ago, Singing Bushlark
numbers have increased over the last week, Koels have been calling over the 
past 2 weeks, Hillary
Thompson reported a Satin Flycatcher in Cairns on the 4th Oct., they are not 
reported very often
here. The Cicadabirds (Rainforest ones) have just changed their calls 3 days 
ago they are now making
a zitt zitt zitt rapid call instead of there more usual  call which is a slower 
more whistling call
(terrible attempt at describing this call!). Most Intermediate Egrets left town 
over the last three
weeks, presumably to go south, I had one wing-tagged bird from northern NSW 
which had been hanging
around the Cairns airport earlier in the year.
Noisy Pittas have been calling for the last three weeks at least as have the 
Red-necked Crakes.

There has also been a dramatic drop in the number of Pied Imperial Pigeons in 
the area - the people
who count the numbers (Margaret Thorsborne, Dave Green, John Winter and 
volunteers ) of birds
returning to the Brook Islands offshore from Cardwell (half way between Cairns 
and Townsville) have
reported .

Count numbers of birds returning to nest over the past few years are as follows:
        11 Oct 99        1,600
        12 Oct 98       29,000
        11 Oct 97       28,940
         5 Oct 96       25,338
         7 Oct 95       15,221

The numbers around Cairns certainly seem low as well.

Regards
Keith & Lindsay Fisher
PO Box 2209, Cairns QLD 4870

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