WA - 2017. Fairy Terns, Fairy Wrens, Orchids & Osprey.

It's good to be back in Perth and I am looking forward to meeting up with Bird Life Aus people to visit the Pelican Nature Reserve on the Swan River. Then travelling South beyond the Margaret River to Denmark. I've hit the ground running!

I'm too early for the Fairy Tern nesting season but have been invited by Dr Nic Dunlop to his Fairy Tern workshop and presentation in Mandurah which is an hour South of Perth. I'm keen to check out their decoys which I photographed on previous visits as they appear to be more substantially build than the polystyrene ones we use in NZ.

Timing is spot on for the wild flower season so looking forward to seeing the sites on my list on route to Denmark.

Monday 11th Sept
  Wireless Hill to see the Wildflowers.

Kangaroo Paw

Donkey Orchid

Tuesday 12th Sept
  A visit to Bold Park to visit the Birdlife Aus office and then walk to the top of Reabold Hill then back via the Tuart track. Temperatures in the low 20's are just good for walking
Tuesday Evening
In the evening a  meet-up at Pelican reserve with Murray and Kath from Birdlife Aus. The highlight for me was seeing an Osprey ripping a fish apart as it fed on a wooden post in the Reserve. We counted 23 species of birds on our evening circuit of the Reserve.

WildLife Habitat Protection
I was also interested to see the off-shore line of 7  buoys that are there to protect the shore sand edge of the reserve where birds roost and nest.. These are marked with WildLife Habitat Protection. I'm interested to promote this idea at Shoal Bay to protect the High Tide Roost sites from increasing disturbance from water recreational users especially as the population grows with increased infill housing.

Wildlife habitat protection on the Swan River

Wildlife Habitat Protection

Wednesday 13th Sept
Kings park to search for wild orchids fortunately I met up with some keen orchid hunters. Photographed the Spider orchid, Donkey Orchid, Pink Fairy orchid, and the Cowslip orchid.

Thursday 14th Sept
Headed to Mandurah about an hours drive South of Perth to attend the Fairy Tern workshop on the invitation of Dr Nic Dunlop.

Arrived early afternoon and had an explore of the area finding Fraser Lake and meeting Brian who kindly pointed out an Osprey nest.

30 keen people attended the Fairy Tern work shop and listened to Nic outline local projects to create a Fairy Tern Sanctuary and then we all took part in painting Fairy Tern decoys which was just what I wanted to see.

Presentation and workshop for the Fairy Tern Sanctuary

Friday  15th Sept
Headed South West to Dunsborough via Jarrahdale and Harvey.

Saturday  16th Sept
Orchid and Splendid Fairy wren photography in the Cape Leeuwin National park. This is one of my favourite stretches of coastline. The stretch between Meelup beach and Castle rock is always a delight.

Splendid Fairy Wren (female)

Splendid Fairy Wren (male)

Spider Orchid

Sunday 17th Sept
Travelling further South to Denmark via Nannup

Monday 18th
Exploring the Wilson Inlet.

Staying amongst the Giant Karri trees overlooking the Wilson Inlet

Entrance sand bar to the Wilson Inlet.

Tuesday 19th
Albany and the whaling museum in at Discovery Bay in the Torndirrup forest Park. Amazing Geology at the Gap.

Wednesday 20th
The lake House with the white browed babblers in a group of 4 on the ground. Then the Harewood Reserve Walkway.

Thursday 21st
Very wet day exploring Peaceful bay but the light was just right after the recent rain to walk in the forest near Walpole to see the  Giant Tingle trees.

Friday 22nd
Searching the head of the Wilson inlet for Aus Fairy Tern and found three on the sand bar entrance.

Three Fairy tern and a silver gull at the entrance to the Wilson Inlet.

Then spotted a Southern Right Whale with calf. Moved along the coast for a better view overlooking the whales.

Southern Right Whale with Calf

Saturday 23rd
Left our house in Denmark that overlooks the Wilson Inlet set below Giant Karri trees  and headed for Cranbrook to see the Stirling Ranges. Immediately  South of Cranbrook is an excellent wild flower reserve - The Cranbrook Federation Wildflower Reserve. Many white spider orchids here.

The Stirling Ranges

Staying at Kojonup in a converted Clover/Linseed oil shed. Clover House was very comfortable indeed and I felt very relaxed here .
Kerrie the owner proudly showed us her art creations and art gallery, Outside her sculptures created from recycled materials were dotted around her riverbed garden. A very talented lady.

Amazing wild flowers including wild orchids at the Myrtle Benn Reserve. This area is a biodiversity
hotspot.

Myrtle Benn Reserve habitat

Sunday 24th
Farrar Reserve also near Kojonup is an amazing place too for wildflower diversity. Meeting up with other people who were keen to share their finds of orchids helped as we too shared our finds.

Blue Orchid

Spider Orchids

Dragon Orchid

Zebra orchid

Sundew

Tuesday 26th Sept
Now back in Perth. Osprey on lamps above a breakwater at Cottesloe.

Two Osprey on Lamps over breakwater

Osprey close up

Tuesday evening meet-up with Charles, Murray, Kath & Jean to walk around the Pelican Reserve for a bird count. Great to see the Little egret, red-necked stints and sandpipers.

Little Egret

Thursday 28th September
Point Walter sandbar on the Swan River. Another favourite place. A large flock of between 100-200 little black cormorant flew over then landed on the water and then began rounding up fish by flying together in a long drawn out line. Quite a sight. A lone Terek sandpiper  feeding and disturbed by a hooded plover. Also red-capped plover and red-necked stints feeding too. A lone Great cormorant flew over too.

Great Cormorant

Hooded plover chasing Terek Sandpiper

Friday 29th Sept 

Fremantle then Point Walter to check out the birds. Tide out today. Just crested Terns and silver gulls but heard then watched two Fairy tern at the far end of the spit flying fast and high.

Sat 30th Sept

Back to Mandurah to see and help with setting up the Fairy Tern sanctuary behind the breakwater. Lots of helpers to help spread a huge pile of shell spoil across the site. Soon to follow will be the fencing and then the placing of the decoys.

Formidable pile of shell to be spread around the site

Many hands make light work. Yes that's me in there too.

The pile of shell has been spread across the whole site.

Tuesday Oct 3rd   -  Joondalup Lake Regional Reserve
Unusual duck for me the musk duck strange lobe under its bill.


Tues Evening - Pelican Reserve 23 species recorded including a fan tailed cuckoo and blue shoveller. The red-capped plover have two juveniles now.

Then to the Italian Restaurant meeting with other Pelican Point supporters. Great pizzas, a very enjoyable evening. Many thanks pp people for the invite.

Thursday Oct 6th  - Rottnest Island
The Island is a honeypot for tourists but it is possible to find quiet stretches of the coast and inland Lakes and enjoy the unique wildlife including the Quokkas.

Headed straight for the Osprey stack nest that I visited in 2016. There are said to be 10 stack nests on the Island. This year  there are again a pair of Osprey this time with young but I couldn't get a photo of the chicks. However I did enjoy watching and getting these shots of the Osprey returning with a very large fish.

Osprey returns with large fish catch

Osprey returns to stack nest with fish for chicks and mate.

The Salt lakes are an amazing habitat and this is an area I always head to on the Island Its a peaceful spot the causeway between the two lakes with so many birds to see.

Ruddy Turnstone

Red-necked stint

Saturday 7th Oct -  John Forrest National park
Full of wild flowers and orchids too on the scarp of the Darling Ranges.

Distant view of Perth from the Darling Range.

Fringe Lily

Lemon scented Darwinia

York Township -A delightful historic Town set in the Avon Valley.

Clifton Park Reserve and Leschenaultia Lake

Sunday 8th Oct  - Forrestdale Lake.
Large Lake of Ramsar significance. Rather too much water in the Lake at the present time but as it dries out it becomes and importance feeding site for thousands of wading birds. Extremely important site for Aboriginal people. It was settled in the past due to an abundance of food including the long-necked turtle which are said to be still present.

Piney lakes

Monday 9th Oct  Point Walter

Fairy Terns diving for fish. Terek sandpiper and many other birds.

Tuesday 10th Oct
Pelican Point Nature reserve with Murray, Charles, Kath, Jean and David. A cool strong breeze but a good show of 26 species.

Wednesday 11th Oct
Swan river dolphins.

Arrival of the Godwits

It was great to get an email from Graham announcing that three bar-tailed godwits had arrived in Ngataringa Bay.

  I had to check the High tide roost sites this morning and counted 22 now at Ngataringa Bay. Last year they reached 260 recorded at Shoal Bay on the 15th of December 2016.

On a high tide roost site in Shoal Bay estuary there are still two  of the sixty three wrybill, left.  We would have expected them to have left for the South Island for breeding by now.

 

Miranda Calling

Great to attend the residential NNZ Dotterel course at the Miranda Shorebird Centre this week. John Dowding is the 'Master' when it comes to all things 'dotterel'

John's depth of knowledge through his  research work over many years and his keenness to pass on information to help with dotterel management make for a great few days.

 It was good to catch up with familiar people and some new  from DOC, Auckland Council and other voluntary groups around the East and West Coast too of the North Island.

John teaches the distance that it  is safe to move at risk nests.

Photos to follow.

Time and Tide wait for no man

And for no women either. And so it was that my 'Monday friend' and I  arrived too late and missed the  opportunity to cross  to the northern beach while the tide was favourable.

Trap maintenance

 The river seemed too deep to wade across and I had feelings of deja-vu for a previous attempt by me which ended in a thorough soaking much to everyone's enjoyment a year or three back.

Oh well there was still plenty to see and another two beaches to explore..
More to follow......................

Rivers to the Shore

Zoo Kids

It's always fun at the Auckland zoo and yesterday with my 'Monday friend' there were lots of laughs as we explored all the fascinating set-pieces housing fascinating creatures from around the World.

 It was good to view the zoo through another persons interest and to take a different route to explore. Even the old Meer Cat tunnels were worth exploring just for the heck of it. We stayed until 5pm winter closing time.

I'm a regular visitor to Auckland zoo whenever I have a couple of hours free as I have an annual pass. I really admire the wonderful location and the huge input to NZ wildlife too and the interest and dedication of the staff.

With both of us having an interest in predator control we were intrigued to  see several rats in pens which was of particular interest for us to try and ID the species. Brown rat or Black rat we wondered. Not easy to ascertain as they move quite fast and with only my small camera I was not able to get a high quality photo this time.

Chew Results.

I wasn't quite sure what to expect from our 15 chew cards set up on the shell banks on metal rods but some have been well chewed and some just slightly nibbled and some not touched at all.
.
 Amy and I also checked out along the  extremely slippery steep slope of the estuary cliff  bush fringe the two lines  above Shoal bay shell banks  and found plenty of chew activity on these tasty lure impregnated cards that we had fixed to trees. Some cards were eaten in half.

Tomorrow we will check out Upper Shoal Bay and Ngataringa park.

Tuesday 25th.

Lotte joined me on a sunny morning to check out and collect up the Upper Shoal chew cards and again quite a lot of rodent activity. In the afternoon I returned to Ngataringa park and collected up the three chew lines of cards.  It was fortunate that I had GPS'd these which made them relatively easy to locate.

Just waiting to hear now how Graham got on with Steve and Cam in Ngataringa bay. Then all  the cards will be ready for collection and analysis by Craig and the Auckland Council  RIMU research unit. It will be interesting to hear what they make of the results.


Photos to follow..............................

Chew This over

Today (Friday) we began our chew card project on five sites that I had designated and offered to the Auckland RIMU ( Research unit)  covering different habitats but aligned to our predator control project.

Amy joined me on this stormy  morning with lightning flashing across the estuary to GPS and fix metal stakes on the Shell Chenier bank at Shoal Bay and this may tell us that rats swim out to these islands that are nesting sites for dotterel, pied stilt and variable oystercatcher and roosting sites for several At risk species of wading bird including wrybill and godwit..

Storm clouds, lightning and a rainbow as we installed the chew cards on metal rods

The chew cards are impregnated with a bait lure to attract rodents and its going to be interesting to re-visit after there nights to see what has nibbled the cards.

Amy was recently in the Norfolk Islands completing her Masters degree so was the ideal person to help me particularly in the afternoon when we tackled the  steep and slippery bush clad cliff edge to fix cards to trees..

Then Yesterday (Saturday) in torrential rain I met up with Emma, Nerida, Stephen and Lotte to lay two chew cards lines in Upper Shoal Bay along the Patuone walkway.

Then in the afternoon Dan helped me set up the three chew card lines in Ngataringa Park.

I was very grateful of all the support for this project particularly on such an atrocious weather weekend.
Next week after three nights we will retrieve the cards for analysis by the  RIMU team and then we will have some base line data.

Out of Africa

A regular pair of Barbary doves live in the area and frequent the bush edge of Shoal Bay as well as local gardens. A native to North Africa but released in New Zealand and now quite widespread in the North Island.

 They regularly drink at my garden pond and find seeds on the driveway and today while one was preening its feathers the other pecked away at the bark of the eucalyptus tree.

Hunkered down

Its very cold this morning with a brisk cold southerly. However this wasn't going to deter me from checking if the wrybills were still around at Shoal bay.

I was tempted to just have a quick scan with the binos  but a scope search revealed a group of 42 wrybill at the far end of the Chenier shell bank hunkered down against that strong southerly.

Click on image and count the wrybill - I make it 42

Romeo and Juliet our two resident variable oystercatcher were also present and just one NZ dotterel quite nearby.
I then moved on to check the Bayswater side of Shoal and then to Ngataringa Bay shell bank to further record SIPOS, VOCS, Caspian Terns and Pied stilts.
Photos to follow.

Five Eyes ?

Well actually five signs! To protect the high tide roost and nesting site of shore birds. It was good to meet up with Alex from DOC to add to and replace a rather tired sign at this vulnerable but important site.

Hopefully dog owners will act responsibly and follow the 2015 ruling that Dogs are not permitted on these shell banks.

Nothing Ventured......

Nothing gained! I was wondering what I had let myself in for when I recently volunteered to speak to a Forest and Bird submission at a Resource Management Act (RMA) hearing to try and save a notable tree from demolition ........
More to follow.

Shoal Ngataringa Wader Census Count

It was good to have Jim Eagles join me for this mornings sunrise wader census count. It was a beautiful morning and the estuaries were like mill-ponds. A good spread of species were observed including wrybill, South Island Pied Oystercatcher, Variable Oystercatchers, pied stilt, banded dotterel and NZ dotterel.



Waitemata Wader Census morning- Just like a millpond

SIPOS on High Tide Roost shell bank



Wrybill




Pied stilt with banded dotterel behind

In the afternoon It was good to meet up with Emma and her neighbour Barrie both Upper Shoal Bay local residents to set-up and GPS a new predator control bait line.

Emma and Barrie setting up a bait line

Miranda Winter Census

A beautiful day to be counting birds after a foggy drive to the Miranda Shorebird Centre. I was pleased to be able to help as we paired up and were sent to different shorebird locations along the coast and inland on some farmland sites. I counted up to 1700 when something disturbed them and had to start again. Gillian was more successful and made it to 2200



That's over half the World population of Wrybill at Miranda today



Wrybill can be fidgety birds not the easiest to count

We will soon be adding our count for Shoal and Ngataringa Bay as our local contribution to the winter Waitemata census.

Strutting Our stuff

Well here I am at the Pest Forum last Monday strutting my stuff explaining the Shoal Environment and where the predator control with help from the 'Ratpack' fits in.

Kym is strutting her stuff too facilitating our meeting

 

The French Connection

Great day on the Mangawhai coast meeting up with Sofiane who is an intrepid traveller. Sophiane has travelled extensively through Australia and Japan and is part way to Cape Reinga following the Te Ararowa trail. He had many tales to tell of near death experiences during his travels.



Looking for a safe place to cross this river

 

 Sofiane was camping nearby on route from Bluff so we asked him to join us for a day exploring the three dune beaches checking traps for predators.

 Three weasels, two hedgehogs and a mouse was a good total for the day. We finished the day with a Cointreau or two and then an Indian meal joined by other friends.

A great day and I'm looking forward to meeting up with Sofiane when he returns to Auckland after completing his walk and also hearing about the next leg of his travels.

Chew Card Project Tour

Its been an eventful week with meetings, walks, attendance at a tree hearing for a notable scheduled listed pohutukawa and today a walk on the wild -side to show Craig from Auckland Council the Shoal and Ngataringa estuary habitats.

 Amy joined us and I was pleased to have her along as she has recently returned from the Norfolk islands where she completed her Masters degree and more work on a bird trans-location project to an off-shore Island.

Craig from the  Auckland Council Biodiversity department is going to help with a chew card project at various locations around the estuaries to check for the presence of rats. We were pleased to listen to his advise and look forward to starting this project including checking the high tide  shell bank roost sites.

It was good to meet up with Roger and Cecilia at Ngataringa Park and be shown around. Then to Ngataringa Bay to meet with Graham to see where cards can be laid on the shell bank.