masked lapwing

Eastern Beach: Lapwing Chicks, Cantankerous Gulls and Pooping Gannets

November 20, 2015 by Jade Craven Leave a Comment

I can hear it now. “Another poop shot? Don’t you get sick of it?”

No. Heck no.

I was on my way into town – to photograph something street related. Maybe I was super anxious. Regardless, I had poo on the brains. Specifically, how to get a gannet poop shot.

You see, I had never seen one poop. I’d spent hours watching them trying to get a good photo. I’d only managed two photos of birds in flight doing #2’s and they were a matter of luck. I wondered about trying to find them at where they nest but didn’t know if I’d be able to see them for long enough. It can take hours to get a good shot.

I’d decided that it wasn’t even worth strategizing how to get one. I’d focus on getting the normal dive shots and hope to get other birds pooping.

About 10 minute into the twitch, I got this.

Yes, I am immature. Yes, it is a silly hobby. Yes, it felt bloody amazing to capture it. I saw them poop a second time in this session. It was almost worth going home then and there. Until I saw this:

One of the dolphins that loves hanging around Corio bay. It stayed for longer then it usually does. It went back and forth, and showed more of the body then I normally see. Photos are mediocre but I don’t care.

Shortly after, I saw this seagull harassing a gannet. It did it for at least 10 minutes. Incredibly hard to focus on the birds but it definitely wasn’t pleased. I have no idea why the gull was chasing it for so long.

The final species I saw for the day was this pair of masked lapwing. At least I thought it was just a pair. They were behavioring very territorial and then I saw it. There were two chicks nearby!

They were hanging around at the roads edge and trying to cross the road. It was a really busy night and I was concerned they wouldn’t make it. One of the adults kept on running at any car that passed and spread its wings out.

I would love LOVED to have seen them hide the chicks under their wings. I didn’t want to hang out too long though as they were obviously upset. So interesting to see them at multiple stages of their breeding cycle.

Eastern Beach is an underrated birding destination. It is probably the same as many suburban beaches. I’d assume many along the Bellarine are better. 🙂 So many places to visit and such little time.

Balyang: Early November

November 18, 2015 by Jade Craven Leave a Comment

This trip took place on November 9.

There is a problem with repeated visits to the one location. You see all these interesting things that warrant documenting. Yet, that don’t fit into a normal narrative. Normally this is fine. Lately, however, it means a whole bunch of posts titled ‘Location: other.’

I have no idea if there is an easier way to process these notes. Feel free to email me with ideas. For now, as I have a small readership, this will do.

I saw this raven while walking along a street towards Balyang. I’m assuming the purple bit is a gape and that it indicates it is a juvenile.

There was a raven seemingly collecting nesting material. It did drop it, without provocation from the cantankerous willy wagtail.

A beautiful long billed corella was hanging around. It was coorporative for my project of taking photos of birds drinking. As was this red rumped parrot.

I was photographing the white faced heron when I saw what I’m assuming is the parent flew towards it. I have no idea why they still hang out and what the dynamics are of their relationship.

I hate mynas – but I still enjoy getting photos of them with food in their mouth.

There was a lot of activity in the tree above me at one point. I’m assuming some of these are juveniles.

The above is a sulpher crested cockatoo without the crest. At first I wondered whether it was a hybrid, as I don’t believe I’ve seen one without a crest before. It made no sense. Could it be a young?

I asked online and they said it could have lost its crest for a number of reasons. I don’t think it is a juvenile. I’ll tell you why in a future post. Babies, babies galore at the moment!

There appears to be ducklings galore too, but they never hang around for long. I think they realize pretty quickly that it isn’t safe.

I also saw these two feral ducks mating. Couldn’t understand why the duck was sitting so funny in the water until I saw the other ducks head bob up. Apparently this makes me a perv. I reckon it just makes me weird. Science is science. And I can never compete with the other birders so I need unusual areas where no-one will bother to compete.

A juvenile masked lapwing. I was disappointed to miss out again on seeing a younger one, however that disappointment didn’t last long. I love the markings on its feathers and the shorter wattle.

Another corella. Perhaps the same one?

This eurasion coot photo almost isn’t worth sharing. Really, I was trying to get a poop shot. I *just* missed. I still love it poking its little tongue out.

I kinda can’t wait until the mating/breeding season is over and I can start revisiting other places again. It’s going to be weird NOT posting daily.

Glenn testing out the new lens at Eastern Beach

September 24, 2015 by Jade Craven Leave a Comment

I know, I know. My post titles are just getting even more awesome.

We’d had the new lens for about 6 days as of Yesterday. I tested it out the day I got it, despite being pretty crook. Glenn has had an exhausting work week so didn’t have a chance to check it out until yesterday. Naturally, this made me pretty antsy. I hate it when the camera is going unused, even when I’m unable to go anywhere.

We did the usual, with me saying random observations in between coughing fits. Like me, he started with the welcome swallows.

I quite like this one, as the feathers on its chest was kind of puffed out. I would like to go back and spend a while photographing the swallows, or finding other places to capture them. I tend to overlook them in favour of other species. Glenn doesn’t.

He too was able to get a photo of the bird calling, and his photo was heaps better then mine. I’m looking forward to seeing what Glenn can do with this bad boy.

I managed to get this photo while Glenn was in the gentlemans room. Alas, irony didn’t decide to have a dolphin show up at that very moment. That would have been hilarious.

We were fortunate enough to see this tern flying near the promenade. The tracking was pretty hit and miss, although that could partially be because we had it on the wrong camera setting – and the bird moved faster then the gannet! Regardless, I was stoked. I haven’t seen a tern there in ages.

A lot of the photos turned ‘terned’ out blurry but still, quite fond of the ones Glenn got.

Glenn being the artistic nerd that he is. I really wanted to check out the nest to see if the chicks had hatched and, if they had, wanted to get photos from a respectful distance. They hadn’t – which is fortunate as I’m going away for a few days on a holiday. Will have to check them twice a week when I get back 🙂

Gannet

Obviously, the gannet was one of the main reasons I wanted Glenn to test out the lens. The other lens just wouldn’t focus and both of us would get really frustrated at all the shots we missed.

We managed to get lots of interesting and clear shots of this gannet diving. At one point it caught a fish – I could visibly see it! But Glenn wasn’t focusing on the bird, he was looking to check the photo quality.

I totally understand why as I’d told him that most birds swallowed the fish before surfacing. I haven’t seen them eating a fish in weeks, especially at that closeness. It was diving a fair bit close to where we were.

The photos don’t really need much commentary – I’ve seen this behaviour so many times before. I love seabird photography though. I’d love to go on a pelagic with Glenn.

Going to Apollo Bay for a few days. You jealous? I can tell, you totally are 🙂 ROCKPOOLS HERE I COME!

Nesting Masked Lapwings

September 2, 2015 by Jade Craven Leave a Comment

Another day, another post about Eastern Beach. The goal for day was to photograph the bats and then try and get some of the spinebills at the botanical gardens. The radar looked promising and we thought we had a couple of hours up our sleeves.

Ha. As usual, we didn’t really make it past Eastern Beach. It turned out accidentally well. The lighting was in our favour and we ran into a photography friend from twitter. The birds weren’t as numerous as I often see but we had a good photography day nonetheless.

One of the first things I saw was a cormorant diving for fish. It wasn’t having much luck so I walked a bit further. Glenn stayed to photograph the grebe. I didn’t see why – it wasn’t really doing anything. Then I looked at the photos.

Oh Glenn Hewett, I love you! He managed to capture pretty clear photos of them eating. If you look you can see some kind of growth on its face. Look at the water splash detail in the second photo!

Alas, we didn’t have much luck with gannet photos. There was one flying really low over us but Glenn struggled to focus. The photos from the smaller lens turned out crap. I think I may have gotten Glenn to agree to another lens but I’ll ask again tomorrow.

Masked Lapwings

We were walking up a grassy hill when I heard a lot of squawking. I looked ahead and saw a masked lapwing that was staying pretty till.

“Glenn, walk around. I think there is a nest up ahead.”

Unfortunately Glenn thought I was talking about a tree and moved in the direction towards the pair. Well, they didn’t like that! One started swooping Glenn while he tried to walk away. He snapped a couple of photos – including one of the eggs, like I asked, before walking away. I did start telling him about the bird photography ethics but it wasn’t necessary. He understood, it was an accident. I’ve never seen them nesting before, I’ve read that they do it in crazy places. It was exciting. I kinda want to return when there are babies. I would love to get a photograph of them with little legs under their wings. From a distance, of course.

Other animals:

As usual, I wandered a along the beach to see what animals I could see. I’m becoming obsessed. I did find two jellyfish. These were quite small and have been cropped closely. I’m not even 100% sure they are jelly fish. They may be the lions mane one I saw elsewhere?

Finally, a starfish that looked like it had seen better days.

I’m going to be stepping back from adventuring for a bit. I’ll still focus on nature but not as much. I’ll wait until next year to look for some species and revisit some locations. It’s becoming less about helping me and more about stressing me out. I’m struggling with my minimal workload and family commitments. So I’ll step back, focus on work, and bird when I have more funds and energy. Huzzah!

Dipping on the Tawny Frogmouth

November 28, 2014 by Jade Craven Leave a Comment

This trip took place on the 12th of November

Tawny frogmouths are something that have eluded me for some time. They taunt me. In late Nov/early October, a nest was discovered in the sanctuary near where I live. Some excited birders told Glenn about it on one of his early morning photography missions. I, of course, was doing the wise thing by sleeping in.

I was unable to get down there myself to check it out due to a nasty cold. I had gone to my great grandmothers funeral the week before and was completely wiped out. Driving to Mansfield and back from Geelong is exhausting, even if you’re stuck in the back seat getting asked to ‘stop coughing already.’

On Wednesday I was feeling better. Not 100%, but well enough to walk down there at least. I didn’t know how I was going to get home as I still felt woozy. But there was a Tawny frogmouth!

I wasn’t even at the bridge when I saw a reed warbler. Reed warblers vex me. I always hear them calling along the Barwon river but rarely see them. On this day, I kind of didn’t care. I was feeling rotten. I snapped these two obligatory photos because I knew that Glenn would want me to.

Also saw a different family of wood ducks. These guys aren’t as timid as the family that hang out nearby on the Barwon river. The two chicks in that family are almost adults! I’ve observed these parents with 3 chicks on multiple occasions.

I laid down on my bag for about 10 minutes with the telephoto lens, looking up into the tree. Don’t ask, but Glenn and I have this obsession of trying to get photos of birds doing a poop. I got one once by accident and it’s become a competition. It’s like the birds wait until we aren’t looking. I’ve noticed a lot of great cormorants on this particular tree, although none of them defecated on this visit.

I noticed a shadow pass over and was able to get two photos of a pelican coming into land. The rest of the photos turned out blurry. I think they are a magnificent bird.

Managed to get a clear shot of a red rump in a tree! There was also a masked lapwing that was considerably more tolerant of humans then most of it’s kind. It even took a little bath.

I completely dipped on the frogmouths. I spent 10 minutes looking in the trees and started to feel nauseous. I knew I’d return for a proper look when I felt better. They were very well camouflaged! The walk home made me sick and I ended up sleeping for the rest of the day. Was a nice trip though.

Sidenote:

I took my nephew to see the frogmouths yesterday. He was really excited to bring his lifelist up to 72 birds. I showed him the other frogmouths you can get. He likes it when I say ‘Papuan frogmouth’ because it sounds like it has the word poo in it. I told him that Papuan frogmouths do ‘pa-poos’. It’s my job to be immature 🙂

Also, a teacher at Seths school mentioned that there was an owl in a tree there last year. He better tell me if he sees any cool birds!