What do you do when you discover that you have 38 hours of flexi accrued on
your time sheet? Give Judie Peet a call and go Atlas some western plains
back roads north-west of Dubbo.
It was to be a short day as I had to be back in Dubbo in time to fulfil some
parental duties so we opted for a route that took us from Trangie, to Collie
and then back towards Gilgandra.
The day started well at some roadside woodland north of Trangie. Very few
small birds but Superb Parrots, Blue Bonnets and Grey-crowned Babblers made
up for that. Grey-crowned Babblers turned out to be one of the days more
common species being at just about every stop.
The next place of interest was to be some forest near Gin Gin but the
country was very tired looking and uninspiring. The map promised various
areas with "moderate timber" but we were consistently disappointed to find
only very scattered trees and the area either heavily grazed or under
cultivation - one of the problems in getting good Atlas coverage "out west".
Paddy's Cowal was an unexpected pleasure being fringed by massive River Red
Gum. The water was not visible due to the extensive rush cover but this
couldn't hide the three Brolga, definitely the highlight of the day. A Marsh
Harrier and a Brown Goshawk were nice although a major talking point were
several large ducks flying out of the Juncus into the sun. Too big for
Woodies, the only thing that sprang to mind were errant Mountain Duck. Not
being able to find them again, these were the ones that got way. Judie
wouldn't let me live this one down for the rest of the day.
>From here, the scene was just about set. What I thought was going to be a
day of woodland birds became the Great Western Plains Wetlands Tour! Water
was everywhere and this certainly made for greater interest in largely
cultivated country. Plenty of Pacific Herons, White-faced Herons, ducks and
ibis. A large cowal covered in waterfowl was a wonderful find with
Shoveller a nice addition to the list. These were also on the next wetland
visited along with the "rare and endangered" (see previous threads about
this) Emu on the roadside.
Collie cemetery promised much being an apparently nicely reserved bit of
woodland but was monopolised by Noisy Miners, Apostlebirds and Crested
Pigeons. A Spotted Harrier over lunch and a pair of Blue Bonnets provided
relief.
Berida State Forest provided the first really nice patch with small birds.
Nothing striking but Inland Thornbills, Chestnut-rumped Thornbills, Western
Gerygone, Brown-headed Honeyeater, among others kept us entertained. As did
a rather nice 5 foot long Blue-bellied Black Snake that Judie kindly alerted
me to just as I was about to put my foot within 30 centimetres of its head.
Oh, and the Southern Boobook was also nice.
Time was getting away from us so back to Dubbo we headed, or so we thought.
A strong burning smell prompted me to pull over and lift the bonnet. A
seized up engine pulley looked to have put paid to those plans. On the
bright side, the hour spent at that uninspiring bit of roadside 16 km west
of Gilgandra yielded some surprising birds - Grey-crowned Babbler (not that
surprising really given the number we had seen), Black-faced Woodswallow,
Southern Whiteface and, lo and behold, a single White-winged Fairy-wren.
This, to my mind, is to the east of their supposed range limit and an
interesting find. We were first alerted to this bird by it's call in the
roadside grass. A lone brown bird obligingly jumped up onto the fence every
time I squeaked at it confirming the identification. An interesting find
that we would have missed had the car not played up.
My wife wasn't at all upset at having to pick up our daughter and missing
out on her coffee afternoon with work collegues.
David Geering
Birding-Aus is on the Web at
www.shc.melb.catholic.edu.au/home/birding/index.html
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