Hi Stephen, I’m pretty familiar with Metromix (not megamix – I assume autocorrect?) Swamp, and about the only birds of any sort of rarity that nest there are Pied Oystercatcher. It’s popular with fisherpeople, rubbish dumpers, sleeping truckies, and local teenagers looking for a place to have a sneaky drink and/or smoke, etc. There’s rarely loads of birds there anyway, but it can be worth a look. There are Little Terns but they are much further out on the spit in Towra Point NR – about 3-4 km from Metromix as the tern flies. I’m not aware of any nesting penguins in the immediate area. As others have said, I’d be putting it down to bait collecting. You’ll occasionally see fisherpeople down at Quibray Bay, out on the sand after having walked past National Parks’ signs saying “don’t go here” collecting molluscs as well. I can only assume that when the Greenhills development across the road is finished, that this wetland will become largely useless for birding due to increased disturbance. Cheers Troy =============================== To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message: unsubscribe (in the body of the message, with no Subject line) to: birding-aus-request@vicnet.net.au http://birding-aus.org ===============================
From NSW National Parks:- “The Sanctuary Zone includes Weeney Bay, Quibray Bay and Stinkpot (Towra) Bay. Within the Sanctuary Zone you can only observe: you must not disturb the marine environment in any way.” Fishing is the largest participant sport/pastime in Australia. 10:1 they were gathering bait illegally. Roger. —–Original Message—– Sent: Tuesday, 22 October 2013 7:21 AM I had a very weird experience happen at kurnell recently at a site on Captain cook drive that I have been told is called the megamix swamp. It’s an access point to weeney bay/quilbray bay. There were 3 guys gathered around the boot of their car when I arrived who behaved in such a suspicious manner that it was almost laughable….hastily shutting the boot etc, and when I walked towards the path (and them) staring at me to the point where I asked them what they were looking at, at which point they said ‘nothing, nothing’ then jumped in the car and drove off. When I went down to the swamp, it was low tide, about 6pm and there were another 3 guys down there wading through the mud with buckets, 2 still a long way off, walking towards the exit where I was. When they saw me they stopped walking and sort of lingered. I left fairly quickly as they had driven all the birds away. When I got back to the car, the guys who had driven off earlier drove past and on seeing I was still there, kept on going. Then I drove off and as I was heading out, saw the car had again turned around and was now heading back in the direction if the swamp. It was blatantly suspicious behavior, and at the time I assumed it was illegal dumping of some sort. Upon reflection however, they apparently were collecting something, and had it (or at least some if it) in the car boot when I got there. They had been wading towards the mouth of the bay. So upon reflection I have formed the opinion that it was more likely nest robbing. It’s the right time if year for it too. If I’m right, anyone got any idea what they might have been taking? I think there’s a little tern colony out there right? Also little penguins? All comments welcome. Not sure what to do with the info or who to report to. Sent from my iPhone =============================== To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message: unsubscribe (in the body of the message, with no Subject line) http://birding-aus.org ===============================
Hello all, Thanks to everyone for your comments. I agree that collecting for fishing bait in an area where they know it’s not legal to do so is the most likely answer. It’s not a good thing obviously, but I feel better about that than I did thinking they were taking eggs. Kind regards, Steve. Sent from my iPhone =============================== To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message: unsubscribe (in the body of the message, with no Subject line) http://birding-aus.org ===============================