Sunday, April 3, 2011

NEW CAMERA FOR THE BIRTHDAY BOY


I finally bit the bullet and purchased a new camera, after 6 months of using my mate's old Panasonic FZ20. I had a good excuse: my birthday! I decided to go with what I knew and bought an updated version of the borrowed one, an FZ100. I took it out last Sunday morning on the off chance of shooting a Black Bittern. My friend Vince and I were tipped off about a recent sighting in a local creek at Kiamba and as we pulled up at the site the said bird took off from the bank and headed upstream.

Creek at Kiamba


We waited around for a while hoping it may return, but no luck. There were some Azure and Forest  Kingfishers hunting along the creek and the best I could do was this distant shot.

Forest Kingfisher.

I was able to get a tad closer to this cisticola that was responding to my pishing after I heard it calling in the paddock across the road from my place. I'm assuming this was probably a non-breeding male. 

Golden-headed Cisticola. 

Even with all the rain of late the birds still flock to the bath for their daily splash and on this rare occasion I got seven honeyeaters to sit still long enough for a half decent photo!

Brown Honeyeaters


 And this one  quietly contemplating it's reflection!




This lone silvereye dropped in for a sip.They seem to have moved on from the area lately, probably heading further north.

Silvereye.

Another couple of locals were active recently. This young whip snake was trying to catch some rays when it got disturbed and moved off in a flash.

Yellow-faced Whip Snake

 And this little critter had the audacity to chew on our dogs discarded bone while he snoozed on his couch only a metre away.

House Mouse

Our "watch"dog - Coco