A providential trip to Brisbane meant an opportunity to bird the Ruff allegedly at the Nathan Road Reserve site near Redcliffe and Deception Bay well north of Brisbane Airport. A walk through a swamp [no snakes seen] takes one to a small series of ponds with good tree coverage to hide in. I never found the Ruff but I did find several life-ticks.
First life-tick was a
Marsh Sandpiper Tringa stagnatilus [here alongside a Black-winged Stilt for size comparison].
A
Pectoral Sandpiper Calidris melanotus was the next life-tick.
Some fairy-wrens were knocking about, vocal and active. Here is an image of a male Red-backed Fairy-wren Malurus melanocephalus.
Although this image has a lot of "noise" or perhaps "vegetation", this is the only photo I have ever been able to get of a male Variegated Fairy-wren Malurus lamberti.
Another life-tick was the Mangrove Honeyeater Lichenostomus fasciogularis which I had ticked as a Yellow-faced HE but a local I met there, Steve, assured me that I had made the usual mistake of a visiting Victorian birder. Both species have very similar markings but the Mangrove HE has a little white patch at the posterior end of its yellow mark. This is the best image I got after learning about my new tick!
A small park runs along a waterway next to the Nathan Road Reserve which proved birdful. An adult Pied Butcherbird Cracticus nigrogularis was feeding a youngster ...
... there were plenty of Scaly-breasted Lorikeets Trichoglossus chlorolepidotus in the blossom of the eucs ...
... Pale-headed Rosella Platycercus adscitus, of which I got some good shots ...
... and to round off a good evening of birding, a Cattle Egret Ardea ibis, which had decided to roost for the night in the garden of a house next to the reserve.
