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purple crowned lorikeet

Winter Visit To Serendip

August 6, 2015 by Jade Craven Leave a Comment

Last week, Carolyn asked if I wanted to go birding on Monday. I’d turned down two offers of adventures already (I needed to get the house clean for the internet cable guys) so immediately agreed. The night before, I was kind of regretting that decision. I’d just spent a busy day with the little dude and knew I’d be a bit meh the next day. I decided to just go with the flow and I’m glad I did.

The first port of call was to Serendip Sanctuary. I was at Werribee Treatment Plant with Paul Rushworth when he told us about the baby cape barren geese at Werribee Zoo. I was immediately interested, despite forgetting I’d photographed them previously at Serendip. If they were at the zoo then there was a good chance they would be here. Plus Serendip is slightly more accessible thanks to the recent bus and train changes.

Very, very glad I went as Carolyn is a great guide to the area. She told me about all the places the birds loved.

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Red rumped parrot. Only took the photo because it’s butt was hanging out.IMG_8330

Lizard. It didn’t like it when I accidentally blocked the light to take a photo. Look at how flat its back is!

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This is the nest of a whistling kite. There were quite a few in the area, I was so annoyed that the camera wasn’t working. The nest looks very similar to a crow one. I’m trying to learn more about nests so was very thankful.

Cape Barron Geese

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Turns out that yes, there was a lot of babies. I was so fortunate to be able to see them so little. The geese bred a lot earlier then I expected. Do they even breed later in the season?

I’m hoping to visit here twice a month in the future so I can keep an eye on them, it can be a great learning experience.

Emu

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Serendip is a fun place to photograph emus. Especially if you love the facial expressions.

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Magpie goose. Planning to return over the summer to get more photographs. Do they breed here?

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Young black winged stilts. IMG_8483

Chestnut teal

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Freckled duck. Would love to return here and just spend an hour photographing this guy. The ones at Mcleods Waterhole were a lot friendlier then the pick eared ducks there but I would never be able to get the opportunities that I got here. I just think they are beautiful ducks.

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Buff banded rail. Not sure how interested I am in continuing to photograph these guys but there was at least five in the enclosure.

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The above photos are of a crested pigeon displaying nesting behavior. I noticed the beginnings of a nest above us and saw this guy collecting nesting material.

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Bronzewing. Always a pleasure seeing those.

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Shelducks. Love them. I never noticed the different facial markings before. Also notice the shoveller in the background? Carolyn keeps on proving to me why I should get a pair on binoculars.

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Shovellers again. I believe their orange feet is a way to tell them apart?

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A tree that had fallen down but was still alive. It was ginormous.

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Carloyn was also kind enough to show me the tree where the purple crowned lorikeets like to nest.

I had seen them once before but the photos I got were mediocre. This was pure accident. We were at a distance so the photos aren’t as good as they could have been. I’m very keen to go back to try and get better photos.

~

You need to do multiple visits over a period of time to be able to fully appreciate Serendip, as well as visit there with people who know it quite well. It is very similar to Balyang in that way. It has a lot of hidden secrets.

Filed Under: Geelong And Surrounds Tagged With: Australasian shoveler, australian shelduck, black-fronted dotterel, black-winged stilt, cape barren goose, common bronzewing, magpie goose, purple crowned lorikeet, red-rumped parrot, serendip sanctuary

2 new species of lorikeet for Sethy

January 14, 2015 by Jade Craven Leave a Comment

There have been a plethora of lorikeets around here lately. Seth and I saw musk on two occasions last week. This photo was taken when I was asleep.

My parents were staying and mum noticed lorikeets playing in the tree in our front yard. She quickly found Glenn and asked him to get these photos. I didn’t even know they were on here until I looked later.

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I’m going to practice taking photos of them while they are in the area. It would be awesome to get clear photos of their tongue.

Purple Crowned

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It was 9.30 in the morning. I awoke to a tap on my shoulder and an innocent question: “Was the bird a purple crowned?”

The day before, we had gone exploring looking for purple crowned lorikeets at this little reserve near the Waurn Ponds shopping centre. We could both hear lorikeets but we couldn’t really see anything. They were up really high and the tree cover was so dense. I was just shooting photos of whatever and hoping for the best.

I got home and found this photo. I was fairly certain it was but I had to double check. I did the usual ‘ask smart people on Facebook.’ Seth sat upstairs as I read out the questions I had asked on the Facebook post. He was really getting into the process of identification. He didn’t really want to go to bed until he knew what bird it was, but I reassured him that I would tell him. Hence the early wake up call!

Scaly Breasted

Today, I was sitting on the couch overlooking the garden and talking to Sethy. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a small lorikeet fly past. I instinctively thought it could be a scaly breasted. A couple had been reported near the local shops and I just had that gut feeling. They didn’t look like musk.

We ran outside to look. I was right! There were two scaly breasted in the tree across the road from us. There were other lorikeets in the tree which made it confusing. Seth was so excited, he dragged my parents out to get a look. He kept repeating that, like me, he’d now seen four species of lorikeet. It was really amusing. After seeing the purple crowns, I was going to focus on finding these for the Mr. And I didn’t even have to do anything! Now, to find the little.

The lady who owned the house walked out to have a look. She mentioned how she saw musk in there occasionally. We told her how we saw scaly breasted and Seth showed her the book. I was kinda proud then, he LOVES his nature. Minutes after leaving he phoned up to talk about them. I pointed out the obvious ID’able features. He was also excited to go over a bridge that we had walked under during one of our hikes. Sometimes, suburban birding can be really awesome.

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Filed Under: My Backyard Tagged With: purple crowned lorikeet, scaly breasted lorikeet

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