South East SA - January 2025

For my first trip of 2025 I wanted to cover some distance and hopefully see some birds that we don’t get closer to home. I have travelled to the South East of SA before, but not for several years, so decided to start there. What was originally going to be a trip to Robe, turned into a trip right down to Port MacDonnell and Piccaninnie Ponds CP in the bottom corner of the state, and back up through Naracoorte and Bordertown. 

On the first day I stopped at Parnka Point on the Coorong, Kingston S.E., Robe, where I spotted a Latham’s Snipe - great spot for these at the moment, and Beachport, where I camped for the night in the conservation park. 

On the second day I walked around Woolley Lake in the Beachport CP, visited Beachport Lagoon where I saw a pair of young Collared Sparrowhawks trying to catch Welcome Swallows for breakfast, as well as a Galah taking a drink. I walked around Lake McIntyre in Millicent, where I was delighted to find my first Musk Duck of the year, as well as a large group of Straw-necked Ibises, and a couple of Little Wattlebirds. I visited the conservation area at Valley Lake, Mount Gambier, before heading down to Port MacDonnell. I visited a couple of spots along the coast,  went on to Piccaninnie Ponds including Pick Swamp, where I found a number of new species for the year, including Southern Emu Wren, Australia Hobby and Australia Pipit. I also got eaten alive at the beach and in the swamp but what I believe were March Flies, which had no trouble biting me through my leggings, leaving me with sore, itchy bites all over my lower legs. From there I travelled north to Naracoorte, where I camped overnight in the Naracoorte Caves NP, a nice spot with plenty of rosellas and kangaroos visiting (and hot showers!). 

On the third day I visited Bool Lagoon, which was completely dry, but I still had a nice encounter with a Brown Thornbill and a pair of Black-shouldered Kites. I spent a bit of time driving along backroads outside of Naracoorte looking for water where birds might congregate. I found a nice pond on Old Kingston Road managed by SA water, which was being used by many water birds, including a Blue-billed Duck, a few Australasian Shovellers, Pink eared ducks and more. Next I drove further north to Bordertown. I had a specific target species I was hoping to see here, and I found it! A family of Bush Stone-curlews that calls the Bordertown Wildlife Park home. These are not captive birds, I guess they just like hanging out with the kangaroos here and it is a reliable source of food and water for them. I was very happy to spot a pair of adults with a chick. From here I headed towards home, but since I still had a few hours of daylight, I stopped at one of my favourite spots on the way home - the Monarto Woodlands on Browns Rd. I had been meaning to visit this spot sons anyway, and it was a very slight detour. Here I found Yellow Thornbills, Purple-backed Fairywren, Red-capped and Hooded Robins and more. 

Altogether I saw 101 species on the trip, of which 41 were year ticks (I am up to 114 species this year so far). I really enjoyed the trip, despite the heat and the fly bites, and my first experience of car camping. I am already looking forward to my next trip! I have included some of my favourite photos from the trip below.

Markers indicate where I recorded birds on this trip.

Collared Sparrowhawk, Beachport, SA

Forest Raven, Beachport, SA

Galah, Beachport, SA

Little Wattlebird, Millicent, SA

Musk Duck, Millicent, SA

Eurasian Coot, Mount Gambier, SA

White-browned Scrubwren, Piccaninnie Ponds CP, SA

Australian Hobby, Piccaninnie Ponds CP, SA

Australian Pipit, Piccaninnie Ponds CP, SA

Crimson Rosella, Naracoorte, SA

Brown Thornbill, Naracoorte, SA

Bush Stone-curlews, Bordertown, SA

Long-billed Corellas, Bordertown, SA

Yellow Thornbill, Monarto, SA

Purple-backed Fairywren, Monarto, SA

Red-capped Robin, juvenile & adult female, Monarto, SA 

Hooded Robin, Monarto, SA

Kinchina CP October 2019 - Crimson Chats and more...

For the last few weeks I had been seeing people post photos of Crimson Chats at Kinchina CP. I'd never been there myself, but the chats and some of the other species being seen there were enticing enough to lure me out there. It turns out it's not far from another of my favourite spots, Browns Road Monarto. The Crimson Chats, normally found in more arid areas, were not hard to find with the directions previously given to me. It seemed like they were everywhere! We saw at least 12, and a female was displaying behaviour that would suggest she had a nest nearby and was leading us away from it.  

Crimson Chat (male), Kinchina CP, SA

Crimson Chat (male), Kinchina CP, SA

Crimson Chat (female), Kinchina CP, SA

 I was also pleased to see a Mistletoebird hanging around.

Mistletobird (female),  Kinchina CP, SA

Mistletobird (female),  Kinchina CP, SA

There were also good numbers of White-winged Trillers hanging around, along with Hooded Robin, Masked Woodswallow, White-browed Woodswallow, Elegant Parrot, Red-rumped Parrot, White-browed Babbler, Brown-headed Honeyeater and Spiny-cheeked Honeyeater.

White-winged Triller, Kinchina CP, SA

Hooded Robin, Kinchina CP, SA

Hooded Robin, Kinchina CP, SA

Hooded Robin, Kinchina CP, SA

White-browed Woodswallow, Kinchina CP, SA

 A Southern Scrub-robin, pointed out by some other birders, was a special sighting, as I had only seen this species once previously. We got good views of it, including watching it find and devour a meal.

Southern Scrub-robin, Kinchina CP, SA

Southern Scrub-robin, Kinchina CP, SA

Southern Scrub-robin, Kinchina CP, SA

Another specialty to turn up at Kinchina CP was this Red-backed Kingfisher. Also not common to this area, however we had seen one individual at Monarto in a previous year. The same birders from earlier called us over to see the Kingfisher, and on our way out of the park they had stopped to observe a Shining Bronze-cuckoo - a lifer for me! A fantastic spot, made better by some lovely people that were happy to share their knowledge :-)

Red-backed Kingfisher, Kinchina CP, SA

Red-backed Kingfisher, Kinchina CP, SA

Red-backed Kingfisher, Kinchina CP, SA

 After leaving Kinchina CP we called into visit a friend at his property in Callington, who told me he had fariywrens in his garden. They turned out to be Superb Fairywrens and were quite friendly, and I found he also had some Yellow-rumped Thornbills.

Superb Fairywrens, Callington, SA

Yellow-rumped Thornbill, Callington SA

It was a really nice day, 23 species were recorded at Kinchina CP (recorded on eBird and below)
1. Shining Bronze-cuckoo
2. Straw-necked Ibis (flying over)
3. Black Kite (flying over)
4. Red-backed Kingfisher
5. Rainbow Bee-eater (flying around, never perched)
6. Brown Falcon (flying over, hunting)
7. Galah
8. Elegant Parrot
9. Australian Ringneck (Mallee)
10. Red-rumped Parrot
11. Spiny-cheeked Honeyeater
12. Singing Honeyeater
13. Crimson Chat
14. Brown-headed Honeyeater
15. White-browed Babbler
16. White-winged Triller
17. Gray Shrikethrush
18. Masked Woodswallow
19. White-browed Woodswallow
20. Little Raven
21. Hooded Robin
22. Southern Scrub-robin
23. Mistletoebird

Northern Adventure Day 9 - Alice Springs: Hunting for Bourke's Parrots, and visit to Desert Park

Today was another fantastic day! Jim invited us to go out with him super early to look for Bourke's Parrots (Jim Oatley - Alice Springs Bird Tours - look him up!). So we met him at 5:30am and arrived at the site a bit after 6:00am. It was still pitch black outside, other than a slightly lighter shade of blue just starting to appear on the horizon. Bourke's Parrots tend to come into drink in the darkness just before sunrise and just after sunrise, so we were set up at a dam on the Santa Teresa Road out of Alice Springs, the road of yesterday's adventures. We waited for a while and could see tiny micro bats flitting around, and the beginnings of reds and oranges appearing in the sky. And then we heard them! Several pairs came in to drink - we didn't see all of them, just one pair really but could hear more. The ones we could make out were too far across the dam, and flew away far to quickly to even attempt a photo, but it was really too dark anyway. Our early start was rewarded by a beautiful sunrise.

Santa Teresa Road, NT

Santa Teresa Road, NT

Once the sun came up a bit, a few different birds came along. A pair of black-fronted dotterels were running around, budgies flew overheard but didn't land. black-faced woodswallows, and more. I saw my first Diamond Dove there, and saw a few more during the day. We left the damm, drove further along the road and saw a grey-headed honeyeater when we stopped to look for dusky grasswrens (no grasswrens, and not an excellent pic of the honeyeater!). At another little waterhole, we watched budgies, zebra finches, white-plumed honeyeaters and diamond doves come down to drink.

White-plumed Honeyeater, Santa Teresa Road, NT

Diamond Dove, Santa Teresa Road, NT

Budgerigars, Santa Teresa Road, NT

Zebra Finch, Santa Teresa Road, NT

We stopped at several other spots along the road - Jim knows all of the best spots, and which birds will be in each habitat type - and saw Hooded Robins and my first Western Gerygone. While we were searching for the Gerygone (we knew it was there as it has a very distinctive song that we could hear!), something larger zoomed past. I didn't pay much attention, but Jim said "oh! that was a Bourke's Parrot!", but we couldn't see where it went.

Hooded Robin, Santa Teresa Road, NT

Western Gerygone, Santa Teresa Road, NT

 A little while later, as we were heading back along Santa Teresa Road, I was sitting in the passenger seat and spotted something in a tree near the road.... Bourke's Parrots! 3 of them! They allowed us enough time to pull over, jump out the car, and get a few photos, and then they were off. Needless to say, that alone would have made it a great day, but we were also lucky enough to see several other cool birds, plus Jim's company, made it an excellent day!

Bourke's Parrot, Santa Teresa Road, NT

After our outing with Jim we went to the Alice Springs Desert Park. For some reason I had it in my mind that this was going to be something similar to the Port Augusta Arid Lands Botanic Gardens, but it's not! It's a wildlife park, but just for desert species. It has several aviaries where you can view birds through a window, and two other larger ones that you can walk into and be among the birds! I took the opportunity to practice my bird photography while they were all nice and close, and well as familiarising myself with some of the birds we haven't come across yet but are hoping to see in the wild on this trip! We even saw a Bourke's Parrot in one of the aviaries, which let us get a much better look than the wild ones earlier in the day. I didn't want to post any photos of the aviary birds here (maybe at a later date!), but this one was too cute to resist: black-faced woodswallows, huddling together to keep warm in the wind.

Black-faced Woodswallows, Alice Springs Desert Park (aviary birds), NT

Of course there were plenty of wild birds in the park which I kept a list of and got some photos. We saw a solitary Grey-crowned Babbler (lifer!). According to Jim, one of these escaped from an aviary at the park a while back, and seems to have attracted a few friends that hang around the park. The bird I saw didn't have a leg tag so isn't likely the escapee (unless the tag fell off!). We also saw a Torresian Crow, plenty of white-plumed and spiny-cheeked honeyeaters, and some lovely Splendid Fairywrens, which are obviously used to people walking around, so let me get quite close.

Splendid Fairy-wren, Alice Springs Desert Park (wild bird), NT.