Trip Report: Little Desert in Spring (revisited2013) – bird sites and it’s amazing flora

Tim et al, FYI I can advise that Little Desert is definitely not “Australia’s southern-most population of Malleefowl”, as we are monitoring established populations south of the National Park, e.g. in Nurcoung FFR and Tooan-Mt Arapiles State Park. They are only just south of LDNP but we are following up local intel on locales even further south. If established, they may not become well-known if they are on private land, but the birds are definitely there. Nurcoung is a small, inaccessible area but of 28 nest sites we have mapped in the reserve, 6 we active (i.e. 6 breeding pairs) in 2012. P.S. “we”, i.e. the Victorian Malleefowl Recovery Group, just had our annual training weekend at Wyperfeld NP with our biggest ever roll-up – close to 90 there including 20+ first-timers (and 10 juniors.) Looking forward to another successful season “Around The Mounds”… Cheers, Ross Macfarlane VMRG Secretary —–Original Message—– From: Tim Dolbyhe Sent: Tuesday, October 15, 2013 10:59 PM To: birding-aus@vicnet.net.au Subject: [Birding-Aus] Trip Report: Little Desert in Spring (revisited 2013) – bird sites and it’s amazing flora Hey bird fans, See below a recent trip report to the Little Desert in sunny Victoria; it’s an update to a previous report. To see the full report with images see http://tim-dolby.blogspot.com.au. It is, of course, meant to be a bit of birding and, in this case, floral fun. Any corrections (it was written fairly quickly) or suggestions, please don’t hesitate to hassle me! Ps. may have overdone it with the orchid images – but ’twas pretty special this season. Cheers, Tim Dolby The Little Desert in Spring (revisited 2013) – bird sites and it’s amazing flora I’ve just returned from week (with family and friends) in the Little Desert (early Oct, 2013), a superb Victorian national park. A bit like my recent Chiltern report, this is an update of my original report on the Little Desert. Basically it’s my personal take on this wonderful park its good birding site, and some thoughts about the wonderful plants. Some Background Notes In terms of birds, the park is pretty special. With a list of nearly 230 species, this makes it easily one of the best birding sites in Victoria. When I visit, I have a bit of a wish-list. It’s one of the only places in Victoria you might expect to see Slender-billed Thornbill – so I usually try and target that – and there’s an uncommon and localized population of Rufous Fieldwren. While resident species worth looking for include Southern Scrub-robin is resident, Shy Heathwren, Variegated Fairy-wren, and Purple-gaped, White-fronted and Tawny-crowned Honeyeater. Depending on the time of year, you can see Spotted Harrier, Blue-winged Parrot, and classic summer migrants such as Rainbow Bee-eater, Peaceful Dove, White-winged Triller and Rufous and Brown Songlark. More recently Elegant Parrot, rare in Victoria, has been recorded in the park, so this is another bird to look for. Importantly the park also supports Australia’s southern-most population of Malleefowl, although (despite the park being known for its Malleefowl) they are thin on the ground. Aside from these, it’s always worth looking for inland and dry woodland specialists such as Black-tailed Native-hen, Banded Lapwing, Purple-crowned Lorikeet, Spotted Nightjar, Inland and Chestnut-rumped Thornbill, Chestnut rumped Heathwren (rare resident), Gilbert’s Whistler, Crested Bellbird (becoming increasingly rare), Jacky Winter, Red-capped and Hooded Robin and Diamond Firetail. There are some interesting subspecies such as Grey Currawong (black-winged ssp melanoptera), Spotted Pardalote (yellow-rumped xanthopygus) , Varied Sittella (black-capped pileata) and the Variegated Fairy-wren (purple-backed assimilis). In terms of rare species to the park, Australian Bustard have also been recorded several times – usually at sites that have been recently burnt. Red-tailed Black-Cockatoo have been records in the south of the park, and there are recent records of Bush Stone-curlew. There are occasional records of Painted and Little Button-quail, Black-eared Cuckoo, Cockatiel, Budgerigar, Australia (Mallee) Ringneck, Red-backed Kingfisher, Black Falcon, Orange and Yellow Chat, Black Honeyeater, Chestnut-rumped Honeyeater, Western and White-throated Gerygone, White-bellied Cuckoo-shrike, Forest Raven, White-backed Swallow and Zebra Finch. The last time Regent Honeyeater was recorded was 1900, so I wouldn’t count on seeing that species! =============================== 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 =============================== =============================== 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 ===============================