Greetings all,
I though I would share some recent observations on Little Desert National
Park (LD) my favorite Victorian national park. For those of you unfamiliar
with LD it is located west of the Wimmera region of western Victoria near
the border with SA. The park and surrounds formed the start site for the
Laughable Kookaburras twitchathon team.
The Kiata Campground at LD is a gem of a camping spot where I can guarantee
you will hear numerous Southern Scrub-robins in the morning. In fact, this
year they are either more numerous or more obvious than I have ever seen
them (in the 7 or so years I have been going there). For Victorians, and
in particular Melbournians this would have to be the easiest and most
convenient location to see a scrub-robin. They are calling on and off
throughout the day and during the twitchathon we even saw one foraging well
away from cover - moving about somewhat like a blackbird. This area is
also normally a very reliable and easy spot for Hooded Robin but they made
themselves a lot more difficult to see this year. The campground also is
very reliable for Variegated Fairywrens, White-browed babbler, Brown
Treecreeper, Weebill, Little Wattlebird, Boobook, Aust Owlet Nightjar and
Dusky Woodswallow. This year there were also large numbers of
White-fronted Honeyeaters and Rufous Songlarks and of course New Holland
HEs in near plague proportions (the numbers of these species varies greatly
from year to year). A few Budgies even showed up just outside the camping
area.
The Salt Lake track within about 1 km of the campground is a fantastic spot
for such things as Purple-gaped & Tawny-crowned HEs, Gilbert's Whistler,
Shy Heathwren and at times Slender-billed Thornbill.
The town of Nhill just north of the park is a very reliable spot for Black
Kites as well as the occasional Whistling Kite. The small sewage ponds at
Nhill can at times be surprising and I have seen Musk Duck, Spoonbills,
White-necked Herons, Brown Songlark, Hardhead and even the occasional
shorebird.
Sadly the Sanctuary Nature walk just down the paved road from the track
leading into the campground is somewhat degraded. In the past this was an
excellent site for Mallee Ringnecks but it has now been 3 years since I
have seen a ringneck there. Unfortunately the Malleefowl which has been so
reliable at this site has most likely died or left the area. The mound is
not being tended and grass is growing in it. I can remember arriving at
this site for the twitchathon 4 or 5 years ago and finding it literally
exploding with honeyeaters but my visits during the last 2 years have found
it to be currently very unproductive and not really worth visiting.
I haven't listed all the possible sites and birds and would be happy to
discuss specific species or sites if anybody is interested. I didn't want
to make this a 10 page lecture on LD.
Good birding
Scott
P. Scott Chandry
Birding-Aus is on the Web at
www.shc.melb.catholic.edu.au/home/birding/index.html
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