All up during our five day stay at Bowra we saw nearly 80 species of birds, the most conspicuous being the smaller bush birds. Some were easier to photograph than others, but my main aim when birding is to observe and enjoy the experience as a whole and if I get a decent image that's a bonus.
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| Jacky Winter |
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| Rufous Songlark |
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| Zebra Finch |
I still like to add new birds to my life list though, and did when I found a small group of Hall's Babblers in the thick Mulga scrub about 8 km from the Homestead, pishing one inquisitive bird in for a good look at it's identifying features. It didn't hang around for a photo though and was quickly flying and bouncing off with rest of the mob.
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| Diamond Dove |
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| Splendid Fairy-wren - female |
A bird I failed to find even after some diligent searching around a known area for them was the Chestnut-breasted Quail-thrush, a cryptically patterned ground bird that obviously blends in well with it's preferred habitat.
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| Stony Ridge - spot the Quail-thrush! |
While walking along looking for the elusive Quail-thrush I nearly bumped into the massive web of this large spider. The females can measure up to 45mm in body length and the male a puny 6mm.
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| Orb Weaver |
The image below along with the Brolgas in my previous post is a favourite, primarily because I very rarely snaffle three or more birds in one frame unless it's a distant flock of waders or such.
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| Hooded Robins - 2 males and a female |
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| Red-capped Robin |
Bowra is renowned for its birds of prey and we saw seven varieties there. The bird list has 19 raptor species including Grey Falcon (seen on our previous visit) and Black Falcon, one that still eludes me and my official bogey bird.
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| Brown Falcon |
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| Black-shouldered Kite |
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| Black-breasted Buzzard |
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| Black-breasted Buzzard |
Bowra Sanctuary is managed by the Australian Wildlife Conservancy, an organization that owns 23 sanctuaries across Australia and well worth supporting.
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| Bourke's Parrot |
Cheers & Happy Birding
Looks like it's still nice and green out there John, were the Pied and Black Honeyeaters about?
ReplyDeleteWe did spot a couple of Black Honeyeaters but Pied hadn't been seen in the area for a while. This was back in July 2012 Greg, so it may be a tad different out there now.
ReplyDeleteWonderful post. I really want to get there someday. I'm jealous of your buzzard. Some great raptor shots and all your robins are brilliant and then there's the Jacky Winter....
ReplyDeleteThanks for your kind comments, Russell. I hope you do get the chance to visit.
ReplyDeleteThe buzzard was taken in multi-shoot mode from a fair distance and those two were the sharpest. I was lucky to get the 3 robins facing me and immobile for that split second.
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