Hi all,
Our Norfolk Island trip was meant to start with a quick flight from Melbourne to Norfolk on Norfolk Airways – and then they dropped out and Air New Zealand took over. Bother. Because our dates could not change we flew via Brisbane and arrived on the island, somewhat bemused, many hours later. Wandering dazed through customs we were met by the unexpected sight of Dougald, who had been on the island for about a week. It was an electrifying meeting because he had news of a twitch, a Ringed Plover (currently under discussion as a possible Semi-palmated Plover) at Slaughter Bay. All thoughts of a restful hour or so vanished as we rushed for the hire cars.
With the plover safely found we slipped back into our pre-programmed plans for chasing down the island endemics, most of which we had seen by the end of the first full day. Palm Glen was the place to go to get them all, with the Norfolk Parakeets turning up at about 1830 to feed on the fruiting trees. These trees are a type of guava evidently and we ended up enjoying the fruit as much as the parrots seemed to. The only wanted bird that we missed was the Morepork, but we did hear two calling one night, again from Palm Glen.
On Monday we did a morning tour with Margaret Christian and, as everyone says, it is well worth doing. Tuesday was a highlight though as the weather was deemed good enough to go to Phillip Island and, after a very bumpy and wet ride over, we pulled into the small sheltered cove. The climb up the cliffs was not easy but the views and bird life were spectacular with Black-winged Petrels and Sooty Terns power-flying all around us.
Then, on Wednesday, the weather packed it in with rain and strong south-east winds. Luckily there is plenty of shelter on the islands and we enjoyed lots of birding in the sheltered valleys. Even so, one of the prime birding places for vagrants is at the exposed airport and we cruised its boundaries every day. While we were watching an Oriental Plover amongst the Pacific Golden Plovers we even attracted the airport staff and the person designated to keep birds off the runway when planes were coming in, came over for a chat. His field guide was a bit out of date but someone had marked in it all the species that had been seen over the years.
And all the migratory birds were coming into plumage. The Pacific Golden Plover and Wandering Tattlers were stunning in their finery and even the Oriental Plover had enough colour to show us what it is capable of.
If the feral ducks and geese are included we ended up with 48 species for the week. We stayed at Poinciana Cottages, which are right across from the airport gate and within walking distance to town so they were perfect for our needs. The owners were particularly nice and could not have been more helpful.
All in all our stay was as expected because we had read lots of the B-A reports before our visit. A few surprises though were: 1) The locals think that the Grey-headed Blackbird crossed with the Common Blackbird and finally became extinct. The young blackbirds on the island certainly retain a brown (grey?) head as they moult into adult plumage but many blackbirds on the island also have bald heads, so maybe there is a deficiency in their food. 2) The White-faced Herons have a lot of white down the neck. 3) There is a small (20 +/-) but growing population of Swamphens on Phillip Island. They are feeding on petrel chicks and the endangered skinks but it seems that the birds are deemed “pretty” and a tourist attraction on the main island so no one is rushing to exterminate them on Phillip Island.
In the B-A reports there are lots of comments as to the best time to visit Norfolk. This middle to late week in March was certainly good for the migrating waders and we saw all the resident breeding seabirds, even if the Kermadec and White-necked petrels were only chicks in the nest. As usual, I will start putting up some photos next week.
Cheers
Jen ===============================
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Hi Frank,
Thanks Frank, I will also be putting up a longer report in the next day or so giving more details of where we saw birds and other recommendations for future visitors.
Margaret Christian, who is someone all birders need to meet when they visit, also believes the Oriental Plover has not been reported on the island before. The airport employee we met, however, had an old edition of the Readers Digest guide in his ute and and the page with the Oriental Plover had been marked as a bird seen on the runway. How accurate this is I am not sure but it is possible that unreported birds have been seen on the runways in the past. The bird we (Helen) found would definitely appear to be the first “reported” Oriental Plover for the island.
The “Ringed Plover” was first seen by us on the outer reefs to the south of the jetty in Slaughter Bay (29º 03′ 31.08″ S 167º 57′ 16″ E on Google Earth). We then found it again on the airport runway, resting with Double-banded Plovers, Pacific Golden-Plover and the Oriental Plover. The runways seem to be an important place to scan during any visit, but especially during the migration seasons. I wish now that I had looked more closely at the Readers Digest guide as there were quite a few page markers in it.
cheers
Jen
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