The Sooty keeper of the Figs

G’day I spent a couple of days on the Bunya Mts (Qld) last week. Although it was school holiday time, the campgrounds weren’t packed on week nights, and the walking tracks were fairly quiet away from the Dandabah hot spots. The dawn choruses were pretty good, with the pittas and riflebirds calling regularly. Yesterday morning, I was out before the noisy crowd and looked up while passing through the well known fig (a few hundred metres from Dandabah). While there were no telltale droppings on the boardwalk through the tree, a Sooty Owl (as featured on the info board inside the tree) was quietly roosting on an internal branch about 15 metres up. I was surprised to see it, given that hundreds of people would have passed through the tree on a daily basis that week. I imagine that most people pass through the tree without noticing the bird and it has become accustomed to people so that it doesn’t flush. I think that as long as people don’t shine lights at it or use call playback, that bird might be a reliable feature there. I was certainly able to get good photos without using a flash at 8 am. Regards, Laurie.