This week I found myself with an extra day off, and after swapping a shift, it ended up a three day break! So my dad and I decided to try out our new tent on a camping trip to Gluepot Reserve, north of Waikerie in SA's Riverland region. The first and only other time we had visited Gluepot was in May 2012, so we were pretty keen to get up there for another look! We arrived early on Tuesday afternoon, and set up our tent at the Bellbird Campsite, as we wanted to be close to Josie's Hideaway (Grasswren Tank Hide) where we had a lot of luck on our previous visit. We headed over there for the rest of the afternoon, and as we were walking along the path to the hide, my dad spotted some movement ahead. "There's a bird hopping up the trunk of that tree", he said, and I instantly knew what I hoped it would be.... and it was - a White-browed Treecreeper! My first lifer of the trip already!
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| White-browed Treecreeper, Josie's Hideaway, Gluepot SA |
The time we spent at Josie's Hideaway yielded some nice birds that I don't see as often, such as brown-headed honeyeaters, yellow-plumed honeyeaters, and mulga parrots, but not a huge variety, and nothing that I needed for my year list. We returned in the morning, hoping that more different species might come in for a drink at first light, but saw only the same assemblage.
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| Brown-headed Honeyeater, Josie's Hideaway, Gluepot SA |
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| Spiny-cheeked Honeyeater, Josie's Hideaway, Gluepot SA |
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| Common Bronzewing, Josie's Hideaway, Gluepot SA |
After spending some time at Josie's Hideaway on the Wednesday morning, we headed off the check out some other areas. We stopped at the Froggy Dam hide, but the only things there were a couple of Mallee Ringnecks and a whole lot of Spiny-cheeked Honeyeaters. We proceeded on to the Airstrip walk, where a few days prior there were sightings of Orange Chats and Pied Honeyeater. We didn't see either of those species, however there were a lot of White-fronted Honeyeaters, which I only saw for the first time back in May, and it was great to get a much better view of them here.
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| White-fronted Honeyeater, Airstrip Walk, Gluepot SA |
Next we drove to the western-most bird hide - the Wally and Betty Klau Hide, or Old Gluepot. There were many of the same species we had already seen at the other hides, but then after a while we heard a cockatoo squawk from a above, and had to lean out of the window to see the new arrival - a group of eight Major Mitchell's Cockatoos! This was an SA tick for me, and a great sighting for me, as my only previous look at this species was in Ormiston Gorge in the Northern Territory, and it was from quite a distance. They hung around for a while, first perched in the trees around the water trough, and then wandering around on the ground behind it, eventually taking off and flying off to some trees just west of the hide. I also spotted a pair of Pied Butcherbirds sitting high up in a tree, calling loudly - another year tick!
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| Major Mitchell's Cockatoo, Wally and Betty Klau Hide, Gluepot SA |
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| Mallee Ringneck, Wally and Betty Klau Hide, Gluepot SA |
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| Grey Currawong, Wally and Betty Klau Hide, Gluepot SA |
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| Mulga Parrot, Wally and Betty Klau Hide, Gluepot SA |
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| Galahs, Wally and Betty Klau Hide, Gluepot SA |
We spent the rest of the afternoon checking out some other spots, including the Don and Chris Lill Hide (Emu Tank), the Malleefowl Walk (the mound doesn't appear to be active), and I had a bit of a practice drive of the manual 4WD. We visited the dam enclosure near the homestead, where I found my first Apostlebird of the year! It was quite raucous, and then I noticed there was a nest nearby, so it was probably telling me to get lost! That evening it got very windy, and our new tent really got tested, but in the morning it was still standing, so I guess it must be pretty good quality after all!
We got up earlier to pack up the tent (thankfully the wind had disappeared by then!), and headed straight to the Airstrip walk. Again we saw a lot of White-fronted and Spiny-cheeked Honeyeaters, but this time we also saw some White-winged Fairywrens, including a beautiful bright blue male, and... a Pied Honeyeater! I wasn't 100% sure of the ID at the time, but got confirmation later that night on the Facebook Australian Bird Identification page. Woo hoo, another year tick!
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| Pied Honeyeater, Gluepot SA |
We had another look at the Don and Chris Lill hide, saw the same few species we'd been seeing at all the hides, then started the long drive home. On the way out of Gluepot, about a 50km drive back to the road, we saw a pair of Brown Falcons and some Emus, as well as a lot of cows belonging to the station in front of Gluepot.
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| Brown Falcon, Gluepot SA |
Eventually we got back to Waikerie, where we got some brunch from the Waikerie Bakery (I love that this rhymes!) and went to sit by the riverfront. I had not long finished my pie when I spotted the bottom half of a bird I didn't recognise hanging out from under the shelter over the playground. I got the binos out and then it popped its head out - a Blue-faced Honeyeater!!! "Is that a good one?" my dad asked as I leaped out of the car, "I've never seen one before, a lifer!!!!". I followed it as it flew to a tree nearer to the river, and snapped some photos. This one is an immature bird, with yellow-green skin around the eye, where adults have bright blue, but good enough for me!
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| Blue-faced Honeyeater, Waikerie SA |
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| Blue-faced Honeyeater, Waikerie SA |
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| Blue-faced Honeyeater, Waikerie SA |
After leaving Waikerie we stopped off at Hart Lagoon on the way to Ramco, where there is a bird hide where you can see lots of the usual water birds out on the lagoon, and after that we headed home, where as usual, our pussy cats were very happy to see us!
Altogether I ended up with a trip list of 64 species (including species seen at Waikerie and Hart Lagoon, and others seen while driving). I ended up with 6 additions to my SA year list (now at 193 species!), including 2 lifers, and 1 SA tick.
TRIP SPECIES LIST
- Emu
- Black Swan
- Australian Shelduck
- Australian Wood Duck
- Pacific Black Duck
- Hardhead
- Australasian Grebe
- Little Pied Cormorant
- Great Cormorant
- Little Black Cormorant
- Pied Cormorant
- Australian Pelican
- White-faced Heron
- Black Kite
- Australasian Swamphen
- Eurasian Coot
- Red-kneed Dotterel
- Silver Gull
- Common Bronzewing
- Crested Pigeon
- Horsfield's Bronze-cuckoo
- Nankeen Kestrel
- Brown Falcon
- Major Mitchell's Cockatoo
- Galah
- Little Corella
- Sulphur-crested Cockatoo
- Australian (Mallee) Ringneck
- Adelaide Rosella
- Mulga Parrot
- White-browed Treecreeper
- Brown Treecreeper
- Variegated Fairywren
- Superb Fairywren
- White-winged Fairywren
- Pied Honeyeater
- White-fronted Honeyeater
- Noisy Miner
- Yellow-throated Miner
- Spiny-cheeked Honeyeater
- Red Wattlebird
- Singing Honeyeater
- Yellow-plumed Honeyeater
- White-eared Honeyeater
- Blue-faced Honeyeater
- Brown-headed Honeyeater
- Spotted Pardalote
- Striated Pardalote
- Chestnut-rumped Thornbill
- Weebill
- Grey Butcherbird
- Pied Butcherbird
- Australian Magpie
- Grey Currawong
- Grey Shrikethrush
- Willie Wagtail
- Magpie-lark
- Australian Raven
- Little Raven
- White-winged Chough
- Apostlebird
- Red-capped Robin
- Welcome Swallow
- Australian Reed Warbler
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