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REGENT HONEYEATERS AT
QUORROBOLONG NSW
Six members from the Central Coast
Regent Honeyeater Volunteer Operations Group returned to Quorrobolong near
Cessnock today to check up on the Regent Honeyeaters first found there on
Saturday 2 August 2003, when 22 were located in a box/ironbak /Spotted Gum
woodland feeding mainly in flowering Red Stringybark and Spotted Gum. A return
trip with the Regent Honeyeater Recovery Team Co-ordinator David Geering was
made on 7 August 2003 for a more thorough search, and the group managed to
locate a minimum of 72 Regent Honeyeaters, one nest and another female
collecting nesting material and two colour-banded birds (one with an an
incomplete set of bands). The colour-banded bird that David was able to identify
was an adult female banded in the Capertee Valley on 30 August 1999. This was
the first time that it had been re-sighted.
Since our second visit over 25 mm of
rain had fallen on the site and there were more waterholes in the creeks that
cut through the two private properties where the birds are located. During
this visit we found between 50-60 Regent Honeyeaters. There was no
particularly large concentration although up to 12 birds were seen in the one
big Stringybark that was heavily in flower and where many more birds were
seen last visit. It would appear that on this visit there were more Stringybarks
and Spotted Gums in flower and so the birds were more scattered and less
concentrated. The pair that we found nesting high in a Grey Box, 20m up in the
bole of a mistletoe clump must now have small young in the nest because we
watched both parents repeatedly come and feed something in the nest. But the
sides of the nest are so high that we could only see the parent birds heads go
down into the nest and no little heads were yet bobbing up. Another pair of
birds were seen with nesting material but no nest was located. We did ofcourse
find more Yellow-tufted Honeyeater nests, saw Brown Treecreepers feeding
young, had good views of Black-chinned Honeyeaters and saw both Brown Goshawk
and Square-tailed Kite overhead.
Red Wattlebirds were the dominant
large honeyeaters present and there were a few Noisy Friarbirds too but the
Regents did not appear to be too hassled by them. There were plenty of Little
Lorikeets and a few Musk Lorikeets but alas no Swift Parrots. White-bellied
Cuckoo-shrikes, Jacky Winter, Spotted & Striated Pardalotes Peaceful Doves
and many Fuscous Honeyeaters & White-cheeked Honeyeaters completed the bird
assemblage. No colour-bands were seen on the Regents despite there being six
observers and some Regents were found feeding fairly low down allowing good
views of their legs, although only one was seen going to drink.
There must be similar sites to this
site located in the foot of the Watagan Range where Stringybark and Spotted Gum
are flowering but access to such places is very difficult and so it is hard to
assess as to whether there are other groups of Regent Honeyeaters
nearby.
Alan Morris
Central Coast Regent Honeyeater
Volunteer Operations Group.
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