Lower Birdsville Track

Last month Peter Waanders reported on birding-aus: “good rainfall in the SA outback including the Birdsville Track with some birds having bred”. There has been negligible rain over the last 3 months at least along the lower Birdsville Track which is certainly starting to dry out. However, the birding is still excellent. Despite the temperature still being 38C at 5:00 pm, strong winds all day plus the most flies we have ever encountered, we recorded 70 species between Marree and Mungerannie on Tuesday 6th October. Highlights included 1,500 Flock Bronzewing with many flocks from 45 km N of Marree all the way to almost Mungerannie, 5,000 Budgerigar spread out all along the track, 2,000 Orange Chats, 400 Crimson Chats, 40 Pied Honeyeaters (no Black), 10 Inland Dotterel, 10 Australian Pratincole, 8 Cinnamon Quail-thrush, 4 Eyrean Grasswren, 3 Gull-billed Tern, 2 Gibberbird, 1 Banded Whiteface. We also saw what was a possible Grey Falcon but did not get enough on it for a positive ID. The publican at Mungerannie said Grey Falcon was reported 2 weeks ago so they could still be around. The dune country North of Mulka shows evidence of receiving the most rainfall and currently has an amazing density of birds with a lot of young birds evident – a wonderful sight. Cheers, Bob Sothman & Roly Lloyd Adelaide