We awoke to a grim sky, with regiments of leaden clouds rolling in and scattered showers over the horizon. It hadn’t rained yet, though, and we had to chance it. By now we were surveying sites within the electric fence, and while that didn’t have any bearing on the birds, it meant seeing a lot more animal activity. Burrows were far more common, and footprints of myriad bilbies and macropods –boodies, nailtail wallabies, the odd rogue kangaroo- were a constant feature. The greyness, allied with the early light, made identifying birds difficult, and the odd sprinkles of rain made for suboptimal viewing conditions. Nevertheless, we managed to do half our day’s quota before the rain well and truly began, and came away with a few highlights: a Yellow-plumed Honeyeater nest, good views of a Crested Bellbird (above), our first Gilbert’s Whistler (Pachycephala inornata), and most exhilaratingly, our first Striated Grasswren (Amytornis striata), a male who put on an incredible show, singing loudly for over a minute from an exposed twig. The rain, however, soon put paid to any additional birding for the rest of the morning, and we retreated to base.
We arrived back at base with the donor event in full swing: members of the public who had made significant donations to the AWC had arrived the previous afternoon for a weekend on the sanctuary, and that morning had been trucked around the property to view the infrastructure and wildlife that their money had gone towards. Word at camp was that the Scarlet-chested Parrots had been seen again the previous day, and there was also an active malleefowl nest mound. Heartened by the news, we determined to seek both these birds out at some juncture. The weather cleared sufficiently for us to go out in the afternoon for BEM surveys. After our success of the previous two days, would it have been unreasonable to gun for the hat-trick? As it turns out, yes. Even though we were surveying 500m down from where we last were, the miners didn’t show.
Even so, the afternoon was not entirely devoid of highlights: we heard the Horsfield’s Bronze once more, and had great views of Pallid Cuckoo (Cacomantis pallidus) and Variegated Fairy-wren (Malurus lamberti). We also found a small soak simmering with Neobatrachus tadpoles even bigger than the last, further proof of this species’ dominance of the region. Driving back to base, we saw a small quail-like bird scurrying away from one of the many puddles formed in the road. Post-hoc ID through some hurried photos revealed it was a male Red-chested Buttonquail (Turnix pyrrhothorax), by no means an unexpected species, but certainly not an easy bird to find anywhere and yet another new tick for me.
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