Hi All,
Did some comfortable casual birding at Avoca over the break, of
note were a hundred + White-throated Needletails high above Avoca Lagoon in
a completely cloudless sky yesterday morning. Had seen a handful the
previous weekend under stormclouds at Avoca Beach (Central Coast NSW)
Along the north side of the lagoon is a pleasant walk through
giant paperbarks. There yesterday were over a hundred paired Chestnut Teal
in three main groups, a Male Royal Spoonbill in crisp breeding plumage,
feeding alongside a less than immaculate Sacred Ibis, White-faced Herons,
Black and Little Black and Little Pied Shags, Masked Lapwings. Over a fifty
Pelicans on the east side, two Black Swans.What was probably a hybrid
Mallard/Pacific Black Duck south of the bridge driving into Avoca, a few
Pacfic Black Ducks nearby. Indian Mynas around the village.
Numerous Rainbow Lorikeets and a few Musks flying over, King
Parrots, Sulphur-crested Cockatoos, Galahs, Red-rumped Parrots, feral
Long-billed Corellas. Brown Thornbills, Striated Pardalote and Superb
Fairy-wrens in scrub near the paperbarks, also Eastern Spinebill, many
Noisy Miners, Peewees, Aus. Ravens, Magpies, Williewagtails, Welcome
Swallows, an adult and juvenile Grey Butcherbird, Kookaburra, Little
Wattlebirds, Satin Bowerbirds, Currawongs and Dollarbirds, Male Koel,
Crested Pigeons, Turtledoves, two Sea-Eagles with different moults flying
over the lagoon. The usual Figbirds in the park's fruiting figtrees.
We saw a Black-shouldered Kite on three different days, flying
over the beach-front gardens/scrub along North Avoca beach.
It was striking how far the calls of Superb Blue-wrens in those
beachfront gardens carry, they are clearly audible fifty or more metres away
on the edge of the breaking surf, which is loud enough to make people next
to it to shout instead of talk.
The usual small flock of Silver Gulls were on the beach near the
lagoon, but only two Crested Terns this year so far, one juvenile, and no
Caspians noted. One beachwashed Short-tailed and one Huttons Shearwater.
On the mini- pelagic Ettalong to Palm Beach Ferry trip we saw a
live Huttons, single Wedge-tailed and three Short-tailed Shearwaters, a
single Australasian Gannet.
Cheers
Michael
.
Michael Hunter
Mulgoa Valley
50km west of Sydney Harbour Bridge
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