Pelicans

We had another wet weekend in South Australia, so yet again I was unable to get out and about. I used the time to prepare a new page for my website featuring one of Australia (and the worlds) most enigmatic birds......the Pelican. The Australian Pelican Pelecanus conspicillanus is widespread across most of Australia and is a vagrant to New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and Indonesia. The Pelican is currently experiencing a huge breeding event at Lake Eyre in South Australia and the channel country of South Western Queensland due to the floods in Queensland earlier this year. I never tire of watching them, wether it be one, soaring or swimming, or a flock loafing on the beach or squabbling whilst feeding. A great spectacle is the daily feeding of wild pelicans at Kingscote on Kangaroo Island. Groups of pelicans fly in around an hour before dusk, and some days there can be 100 or more.

Autumn in the Clare Valley

Maryann and I spent this weekend in the Clare Valley wine region 130Km (80 miles) to the north of Adelaide. I was a very wet and gloomy weekend with drizzle and fog most of the time. Saturday was spent further west in the "Copper Triangle". In the late 19th century there was a large influx of cornish tin miners here and a May fair is held each year (complete with maypole dancing and cornish pasties) to celebrate their cornish heritage. (Note: May here is like November in the northern hemisphere!!)

Sunday was spent driving through the vineyards, and I took a couple of interesting shots. This one shows the method used to train the vines so that they can be harvested by machine.

Here you can see the distinct segregation of the different grape varieties within the same vineyard showing later through to earlier cropping vines from left to right.

In the bad weather, only a few commoner species of birds were seen. Willie Wagtails were common along the roadside. This one looks particularly unhappy to interupted!!

And Galahs were seen in the hotel gardens (this photo was taken a couple of summers ago and shows a female - distinguished by the red iris - males have a brown iris)

Confusing Aussie birds

Many Australian bird species were discovered and named by European naturalists and explorers, and were therefore named after more familiar species. This gives rise to some very odd bird names here in Australia. One of my favourite families are the Quail-thrushes. This male Chestnut Quail-thrush was photographed at Birds Australia's Gluepot Reserve in the riverland mallee area about 300Km (180 miles) north east of Adelaide The Grey Shrike-thrush is a great songster, and responds readily if you imitate its fluty whistles. Magpie-lark is one of the most common birds, certainly seen every day, and frequently flies and pecks at its own reflection in windows and car mirrors. The horizontal eyestripe identifies this as a male. The female has a vertical black eyestripe. Finally here is a gorgeous Red-capped Robin - not Robin at all, but a flycatcher.

Parrots

I will be busy in the garden this weekend, so may not get a chance to get out. So I thought I'd post some pictures from my archives.

I mentioned O'Reilly's in Lamington National Park in the last post, and this reminded me about the close encounters you can get there.

There are many feeding stations there and you can get particularly close to King Parrots and Crimson Rosellas, as well as Satin and Regent Bowerbirds

If you are ever in south-eastern Queensland I would recommend a visit. If you click on the Regent Bowerbird it will take you to O'Reilly's website.

Water, Water Everywhere!!

This morning, for the first time since the rains, I was able to walk through Kaurna Wetland Park to catch my bus to work. In the dawn light I could see that all of the pools and waterways were full!! The air was full of the sound of frogs calling, and I resolved to take a quick walk when I got home.

The frogs were still calling this evening, and a few birds were moving around. Nothing special, a few Willie Wagtails, Rainbow, Musk and Purple-crowned Lorikeets, Red Wattlebirds, Adelaide Rosellas and Galahs were all seen. Suprisingly, no waterbirds at all.

Below are a couple of views of parts of the wetland park, and the last picture is an Orange-eyed Green Tree Frog, taken at O'Reilly's in Lamington National Park on a trip to catch up with my good friend Jenny from the UK. You can read Jenny's blog at http://www.wrensnaturenotebook.blogspot.com/

Rainbows and Dragons

It's been so wet that I wasn't able to do much this weekend. On the way back from Whyalla I saw this beatiful rainbow with the Southern Flinders Ranges as a backdrop Australia is a fantastic country for reptiles, and one of the most common and widespread families is the dragons. Around Adelaide, the Bearded Dragon is very common. As you head north into the more arid lands the Crested Dragon becomes more frequent. My favourite dragon by far is the stunning Thorny Devil. I remember being so elated by my first one that I almost forgot to get my camera out.

It's raining!!

I'm glad to say it's finally raining in Adelaide. Apart from one day in March this will be the best rain since December 2008. Rainfall for the past 4 months: Actual Average December 2008 40.4mm 28.3mm January 2009 1.2mm 20.6mm February 2009 0.8mm 13.7mm March 2009 20.2mm 25.5mm April 2009(to 22nd) 5.2mm 38.0mm today (to 10pm) 18.4mm They are forecasting rain right through the weekend for a total in Adelaide of over 50mm. Update 19:30 Sunday 26th total rainfall so far this weekend is 49.4mm Below is the rainfall radar picture from Buckland Park Radar approximately 40km North of Adelaide

Greenfields Wetlands

My local wetlands, Kaurna Wetlands Park, is mostly dry at the moment, so this morning we went to Greenfields Wetlands about 5Km (3 Miles) down the road towards Adelaide.

Both Kaurna and Greenfields are part of a scheme harvesting stormwater for storage and later use, aimed at reducing our use of fresh water, and reducing demand on the dwindling flows down the River Murray.

Greenfields has a network of paths and boardwalks allowing the visitor wide access to the area.

Most of the migratory birds have left South Australia on their way North to breed in the northern hemisphere summer, but in the hour or so we spent there we saw over 20 species. White-faced Heron is the most common heron in this area and true to form was one of the first birds we saw. Great Egret was also here with a couple of the newly split Eastern Little Egret. Waders (Shorebirds) were well represented with good numbers of both White-headed Stilt and Red-kneed Dotterel, and a couple of Black-fronted Plovers.

Other birds seen included Willie Wagtail, Magpielark and a lone Singing Honeyeater.