Today 6 of us (Andrew Patrick, Tony Peri, Cathy Goswell, Sharon Taylor,
Louise Blayney and myself) enjoyed what was the Cumberland Bird Observers Club’s
first Fledgling’s Outing , with our first birding destination being the
Hawkesbury area in Sydney’s north-west. "Fledglings" is a new informal group of
the CBOC that has been created for the teens to mid 30’s age group. Besides
birdwatching, the fledglings may be doing other fun things like dinner parties,
movies, skiing weekends, and perhaps other interesting activities like hand
gliding (and one may soar like a Peregrine or if you are really lucky, with a
Papuan Pied Harrier!!!).
Anyway, we all met Andrew at 8:30 am in such a glorious winter day at Agnes
Banks Nature Reserve (which lies half way between Penrith and Richmond). We
observed a number of Honeyeaters here - White-eared, Yellow-faced, Brown-headed
and White-cheeked Honeyeaters aswell as Eastern Spinebill’s. Several of these
honeyeaters were attracted to the number of banksia’s in flower. We also had a
great view of brilliant male Rose Robin, Eastern Yellow Robins, several Weebills
and 3 species of Thornbills aswell.
Our next stop was then to Pughes Lagoon at Richmond were close up views of
some of Sydney’s common waterfowl were had - a pair of Black Swan with 4 quite
cute cygnets and another pair with a working nest.
We moved on through the turf farms stopping at a much larger swamp with more
waterbirds - Yellow-billed Spoonbill, Darter, Pied Stilts, Black-fronted
Dotterels and many Masked Lapwings. Here we all had an excellent and close view
of an Australian Hobby perched on a low powerline, through’s Tony scope (thanks
Tony). Near Bakers Lagoon our raptor count soared and within an hour, 8 species
of raptor were seen - beside the Australian Hobby we had just seen, we added
Brown Goshawks (2), Swamp Harrier (1), Spotted Harrier (1), Wedge-tailed Eagle
(1), Black-shouldered Kites (a pair busily looking after one or two young), a
pair of Brown Falcons (harassing the Eagle) and Australian Kestrels (3) to the
day’s list. After this at about 2:30 pm, we declared that the race to see 10
raptors in a day in Sydney had begun.
We later carried on around Pitt Town Lagoon and Pitt Town Bottoms Rd in the
hope of seeing 2 more species of raptor. We saw another Swamp Harrier, 2 more
Brown Falcons (a dark-phase and a light-phase falcon) and a Kestrel along Pitt
Town Bottoms Rd. At Pitt Town Lagoon, our much hoped White-bellied Sea-eagles
and Whistling Kites did not show up, We headed to Glenorie were we also hoped
for Grey Goshawk and Pacific Baza but alas, we had to be tempted with 8 species
for the day.
Thanks Andrew for help organising this terrific day.
For those interested in joining the Fledglings, please contact Andrew at:
Edwin
