More Winter in the Adelaide Hills

Today was another beautiful winters day in South Australia. Bright and sunny, hardly a breeze and a maximum temperature of 15C (59F). I decided to go to the northern part of the hills this time, concentrating on Parra Wirra Recreation Park, and Mount Crawford Forest Park. Parra Wirra is all natural scrub, and Mount Crawford is a mix of forestry (mainly Radiata Pine) and also remnants of natural scrub. The scrub is mainly eucalyptus, with a fairly open understory with one of my favourite native plants the Grass Tree. These shots show Jenkins Scrub at Little Mount Crawford, and some Grass Trees. The flower spikes are yellow when they are fresh, and honeyeaters love them!! The birding was really good and I managed to get improved shots of quite a few species. I was amazed when I got home....I had taken over 420 shots in the 5 hours I was in the hills. I guess this is one of the joys of digital!! My first stop in Parra Wirra was a mistake!! I took a wrong turn which after about 6Km (4 miles) turned out to be a dead-end. As I turned round, I heard one of our loveliest songsters, Golden Whistler. It was competing with another great singer, Grey Shrike-thrush.

Then I noticed a movement lower down in the tree, and spotted a female Scarlet Robin. The female is a fairly typical LBJ, but does have a dusky red wash to her breast. I hunted around and soon found what I was looking for....Mr Scarlet Robin!!

On the way back to the main road is saw a small group of Peaceful Doves......

and then some Red-rumped Parrots. Now these must be one of the most frustrating birds for photographers. They are stunning birds, but they are pretty timid, and spook easily, and they always stay in the shade. However, this pair obiously hadn't read the rule book. They didn't spook, and after about 15 minutes they came out of the shadows and into the sunlight!!

Finally, in Mount Crawford, I heard a Fan-tailed Cuckoo, and after chasing it for a few minutes it settled onto a favoured song perch and sang it's heart out for at least 20 minutes.