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australian reed warbler

Balyang Mid Spring, 2015

October 16, 2015 by Jade Craven Leave a Comment

Woo! Finally getting to the last of this weeks posts.

The little pied cormorants were definitely a highlight of the past week, but there are definitely other highlights.

Walking to Balyang

I got a lift from dad to Queens Park so I could check out what birds were in the region. I probably could have walked further if I had packed proper shoes but I didn’t trust my thongs. It was a good decision; by the end of the visit to mums house my legs and butt were really aching. This may have been partially due to my decision to weed mums overgrown veggie garden but I digress.
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One of my goals is to capture as many photos of bird nests, and birds nesting, as I can. I am learning so much from it. I try to be as quick as I can so as not to disturb the birds. This currawong nest was photographed really quickly. It is surprising how many birds nest right next to a busy path, although this was a fair distance away.

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There were a decent amount of baby magpies about. And some over protective parents who are overzealous about people who are just trying to walk up stairs. Below, I discovered this magpie eating some kind of bug 🙂 Part of me wants to research and figure out what it is!

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The hard headed duck, or A hard headed duck, has made a reappearance. Months of nothing and finally, NOW the area starts to get interesting. This reminds me… I should probably go to Drysdale and see how the lens works there!

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Parrots drinking

A highlight of the day was also being able to get photos of a sulpher crested cockatoo and a red rumped parrot having a drink. I think that is my new photographic obsession.
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Turns out I have seen a little corella!

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I have no self confidence when it comes to ID’ing birds. I was fairly certain that these were little corellas but was uncertain, because one of my bird books listed them as being moderately common instead of common. It listed two locations where you could find them in Melbourne. I assumed that this meant there was isolated populations locally.

Wrong! I was right in that most of the corellas I’ve seen in the past have been long billed. So, hi five for me there.

This is me quoting directing from the comment thread on that group. I know this is bad form, but it is primarily for my learning moreso then anything else.

  • West of Geelong Long-billed is very common. Littles tend to be in bigger flocks that cruise around large areas.

  • Long billed have expanded their range into the Melbourne area, not through escapees, but through the clearing Little Corellas are more of an inland species, but again they have increased in number & have come down to Melbourne & Gippsland etc in their large flocks.

Fascinating. It is curious that I’ve mostly seen long billed – and makes me wonder what two littles would be doing at Balyang? I know there are open paddocks a couple of km away. I’ll definitely be keeping an eye out and may try to teach myself their call. It’s probably I’ve seen the littles around and just ignored them. Regardless – it is a lifer!

Great cormorant

The photos may be generic but I was able to get this great cormorant that was just floating about. There is usually one there on each visit.

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Reed Warbler

Was so hoping this was a little grassbird as I’ve been trying to knock that off my list for awhile. The tail was too short and the markings on it and the chest weren’t right. I was hoping that it was, regardless. Mostly because the noise was different.

I went to the playground near Balyang with Seth later that day and ended up seeing several reed warblers, including ones making this sound followed by the warble I’m used to. Again, I learned something. Again, I dipped on a fairly common lifer. It is a bit weird how these guys popped up outta nowhere!

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Little black cormorant

On the Tuesday there was a couple of little black cormorants there, which was awesome. I was hoping to get some photos of some small spats but it never really worked out. That is okay, I think the photos turned out well.

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The final picture is of these ants eating a much larger creature. Sethy said it was a wasp. I also saw a dead blue tongue when walking home.

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~

In sadder news, there are foxes in the area and they killed two of mums chickens. We live about 1km from the river. It sucks.

Filed Under: Barwon River, Geelong Tagged With: australian magpie, australian reed warbler, balyang, balyang. great cormorant, hard-headed duck, little black cormorant, little corella, red-rumped parrot, sulpher crested cockatoo

Balyang: 22nd September

September 25, 2014 by Jade Craven Leave a Comment

We decided to go to Balyang. It was a beautiful day and we needed to resume heron watch. We were walking towards Princes bridge when I saw this bird in the reeds. “Give me the camera!” I said, and got a couple of shots so I could ID it later. I gave the camera back to Glenn. The bird stuck around for a bit and Glenn took this awesome shot.

I checked with a Facebook community and it turns out my original assumption of a reed warbler was right! You have no idea how proud I am. It was an educated guess based on my limited knowledge. 🙂 I’m learning.

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Got a lovely shot of several ibis groups joining. The photo doesn’t reflect how awesome the sight was.

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Only saw three wood ducks this time, near the dead tree

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Seagulls Bathing

Glenn got shots of all of the gulls in the frame, and I then cropped them according to whether or not a bird was doing something interest.

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We got some great close ups! I don’t know whether they are cropped too closely or need further post processing. This girl is exhausted

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The boardwalk

We went to the boardwalk and I told him to try and get some clear shots, or get a photo of something different. Photography is too easy at Balyang. It doesn’t reflect typical conditions during wildlife photography. I’m really trying to help him improve without chucking a lot of technical information at him.

I ended up taking the following thornbill photos. I really wanted to get the shots and Glenn was struggling

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I’m assuming the following bird is a grey fantail. I’ll double check shortly. I was so impressed though. I heard this beautiful bird call but couldn’t see where it was coming from. Glenn said “shhh” and held up his hand for me to stop moving. He then pointed ahead to where the bird was singing. He got such a clear view of it and I was impressed with his ability to find the bird. That’s usually my forte. Glenn is definitely devloping a birders instinct. Yesterday he said he is much more aware of bird calls in general! I may have a birding companion after all 🙂

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Filed Under: Barwon River, Geelong Tagged With: australian reed warbler, balyang, grey fantail, silver gull, straw-necked ibis, wood duck

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