The Birds of Byards Road Wetlands, Jan 2019

Last year was a good year for birding for me, with brief trips to Melbourne and Brisbane, and a longer trip through outback NSW, QLD and SA. I ended up seeing 170 species in SA, and 222 Australia-wide, including quite a few new species. This year is set to be an exciting one for me, with an upcoming trip to Sri Lanka in March (One place still remaining on my tour! - full details at http://craiggreer.com/sri-lanka-untamed-itinerary). I also plan to get out and about around SA as much as I can.

This is my first post for 2019, and also my first since getting my new camera! I now have a Canon 80D with a 100-400mm lens, and I am over the moon! 

I have only been birding in one location so far this year - my local spot, Byards Road Wetland in Reynella East, SA. On the 2nd of Jan I spotted a Nankeen Night-Heron, and have seen it again each evening I have visited since. This species is now a regular summer visitor to our wetland, and last year a pair bred here, so it is exciting to see them return and hopefully they will breed again! As the name suggests, they come out fairly late - I don't think I've seen it any earlier than 8pm, but they can also be seen first thing in the morning.

Nankeen Night-Heron, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Nankeen Night-Heron, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Nankeen Night-Heron, Byards Road Wetlands, SA

On these visits I have also kept records of all the other birds there, and have seen 40 species so far this year. It has been great to see much larger numbers of Hardheads than ever before, and six Black-tailed Native-hens (last year we had four). My first addition for the year to my personal location list was a Great Cormorant. Below is a selection of  recent Byards Wetland bird pics, highlighting just a few of the great species found here.

Hardhead, Byards Road Wetlands, SA

Superb Fairywren, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Common Bronzewing, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Dusky Moorhen, Byards Road Wetland, SA 

Little Pied Cormorant, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Great Cormorant, Byards Road Wetland, SA

White-faced Heron, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Pacific Black Ducks, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Eastern Rosella, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Red-rumped Parrot, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Black-fronted Dotterel, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Australian Wood Ducks, Byards Road Wetland, SA

Black-tailed Native Hens - Not a great quality pics, but I got them all in the one shot! Byards Road Wetland, SA

January 7

After a long and satisfying day out birding yesterday, I wasn't really expecting to do as much today, but it happened anyway! I was up bright and early to meet a group of like-minded birders (Joy, Teresa, Rosemary and Gary) to discuss planned tree removal at my local wetland at Byards Road. The removal of introduced pine trees will affect Nankeen Night-herons, a rather special resident of our little wetland, which nest and roost in the trees. Following our meeting, most of us hung around to check out the birdlife present. We were treated to an amusing display by this pelican, and I saw many other species, including the night-heron in the tree, ending up with a total of 42 species for the morning - probably my biggest ever list for a single session there. It shows just how many different species are using this wetland, which was transformed from an empty paddock just a few years ago!

Australian Pelicans, Byards Wetland, SA

Australian Pelicans, Byards Wetland, SA

Australian Pelicans, Byards Wetland, SA

Nankeen Night-heron, Byards Wetland, SA

Black-fronted Dotterel, Byards Wetland, SA

After our session at Byards I went out for a nice family lunch to celebrate my Grandma's 89th birthday (HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDMA!! <3), and that afternoon I headed out again with my sister Erin, for a spot of Geocaching, and, of course, more birding. We headed to Mark Oliphant Conservation Park, where she had seen a few Geocaches on the map and thought it might be a nice spot for birding too. She was right! Barely out of sight of the car (Loftia Track) and I had seen my first Striated Thornbills, White-throated Treecreeper, Red-browed Finches, Yellow-faced Honeyeaters, and Eastern Spinebills for 2018. We successfully found the geocaches we were looking for, and moved around to the other side of the park (Nioka Track). We parked across from the gate and straight away Erin spotted a ring-tailed possum in a tree. I then pointed out that there was also a koala almost directly above her head. Then we spotted a kangaroo nearby - all 3 species within easy sight of the entrance! We found another 2 geocaches and I picked up Crescent Honeyeater for my year list. We stopped off at Belair NP for a few more geocaches, but nothing out of the ordinary was seen or photographed there. Another fun and successful day out!

 

Eastern Spinebill, Mark Oliphant CP, SA

Ring-tailed Possum, Mark Oliphant CP, SA

Koala, Mark Oliphant CP, SA

Skippy, Mark Oliphant CP, SA

First 3 "lifers" of 2016

For those non-birders, lifers are species that I've never seen before, so a sighting means an addition to my life list - but that's probably fairly obvious!

So far this year I've seen 3 lifers:

The Pied Butcherbird and Nankeen Night Heron were seen on a trip to the Riverland with my dad.

Pied Butcherbird, Waikerie, February 2016

Nankeen Night Heron, Murray River, Loch Luna Cruises, February 2016

This Latham's Snipe was seen at the Laratinga Wetlands at Mount Barker. Not great pics, as it was far out, and it moved when I got a bit closer, but definitely enough to ID it.

Latham's Snipe, Laratinga Wetlands, March 2016

Latham's Snipe, Laratinga Wetlands, March 2016

 I was pretty stoked with all three of these new additions to my life life, and hope to add many more this year, as well as seeing some species that I haven't seen for a while, such as some of the smaller bush birds, and some migratory shore birds that I missed seeing this summer, I'll see them when they return!