BIRDING THE BOX-IRONBARK

For this Sunday's birding trip my father and I decided to go on a walk in the Rise and Shine Bushland Reserve, organised by a friend of his, Clauda. The walk was in Castlemaine, and would travel through the fairly dry box-ironbark forests common to that region. I thought I might be able to get a few new birds on the trip and I was not disappointed.
First off we stopped at Clauda's father's house to have some drinks. Massive flocks of sulphur-crested cockatoos and feral pigeons were flying around, as well as house sparrows in the garden. After a quick tea we all went off to the walk, lead by Geoff Park.
We started off with a quick talk about the forest. Almost immediately around the carpark I spotted yellow-tufted honeyeaters, lifer fuscous honeyeaters and lifer rufous whistlers.  2 lifers in the first five minutes! Not a bad start. As we walked on the calls of crimson rosellas could be heard. Darting through the bush were more honeyeaters, as well as white-browed babblers, a black-faced cuckoo shrike and a lifer striated pardalote. An unidentified raptor flew over, a possible goshawk or sparrow hawk. As we came to a more open stretch of forest, along the edge of the forest next to a grassland, Geoff explained about the different species of tree in this area and how storm damage shaped the forest. Several magpie-larks and musk lorikeets were also flying around the grassland.

The fuscous honeyeater, one of the commoner honeyeaters of the Box-Ironbark

A young male rufous whistler, with the characteristic orange-brown underparts visible

A pretty bad photo of a striated pardalote

We stopped for morning tea in a rather productive clearing. As soon as we arrived a lifer female hooded robin was seen, sadly it didn't hang around and flew off too quickly for me to get photos. Fuscous honeyeaters and white-plumed honeyeaters were flying around, feeding on nectar from one tree. A large dead tree was holding 4 dusky woodswallows, including some younger birds. We continued on along the circuit, spotting a scarlet robin and hearing some weebills. Some people spotted some diamond firetails but by the time I got there they had flown away. We stopped for lunch and Clauda offered to take us to her cottage in the bush. The cottage was beautiful, and several lifer yellow-faced honeyeaters were flying around the front. Finally, we returned back to her father's house for lunch, before heading back to Melbourne.
BIRD LIST: (birds in bold are lifers)
1. Feral Pigeon
2. Sulphur-Crested Cockatoo
3. Musk Lorikeet
4. Crimson Rosella
5. White-Plumed Honeyeater
6. Yellow-Faced Honeyeater
7. Fuscous Honeyeater
8. Yellow-Tufted Honeyeater
9. Dusky Woodswallow
10. Hooded Robin
11. Scarlet Robin
12. Weebill
13. Magpie-Lark
14. Australian Magpie
15. Black-Faced Cuckoo-Shrike
16. Striated Pardalote
17. Rufous Whistler
18. House Sparrow
19. Little Raven

EDIT: Later going over my photos I spotted this one bird I can't identify. Does anyone know what this is? Sorry for the out of focus picture, but by the time I tried to get another pic the bird had flown off. At first I thought male hooded robin, but the belly is jet black. There is probably some obvious mistake I am making. Any ideas? (the image is cropped to show the bird).

BIRDING IN PHILLIP ISLAND

For the long weekend we were planning to re-visit French Island but the ferries had issues so we travelled to Phillip Island. Since we had our bikes that we were going to bring to French Island we decided to do a bike ride on Phillip Island, and we chose Churchill Island. 

The island, although small, was very scenic. Along the beach there were black swans swimming in the water and flying past. Perched on the rocky beach were little pied cormorants and little black cormorants. Nothing too special, but the grassy fields were full of Cape Barren geese! They were walking across the track and feeding on seeds. Masked lapwings, purple swamp hens and Australian magpies were also feeding on insects in the field. While having lunch, I saw an Indian peafowl wandering across the island: I believe this bird is rather well-known to the staff, who have named him Gregory. In the trees nearby I also saw white-plumed honeyeaters, grey shrike-thrush, little wattlebirds, red wattlebirds, superb fairy-wrens and silvereyes. Finally there were Welcome swallows flying around everywhere. Not good, but not bad either. As we left we saw lots of Australian pelicans flying over. We stopped over at a wetland on the side of the road, which had chestnut teal, white-faced herons, more geese and more pelicans. 

A Cape Barren Goose at Churchill Island

After visiting Amaze-n'Things (I spotted a laughing kookaburra flying above the maze, and several were calling as we tried and failed to get through, and there were also some galahs in the nearby pine trees) we went across to Swan Lake. Though the shearwater nests were everywhere, there was no sign of them: at that time the shearwaters would still be at sea. We saw three swamp wallabies hopping around, including one drinking water! A decent amount of waterbirds were there: lots of chestnut teal,  masked lapwings, little black cormorants, little pied cormorants, hoary-headed grebes, Pacific gulls, purple swamphens, and Eurasian coots. A mudflat in the distance also held black-winged stilts and black-fronted dotterels, but sadly none of the migrant plovers. Finally the grassland next to the lake was filled with feeding Cape Barren geese: Phillip Island must be one of the best places to see them. On our walk back we also saw a grey currawong and some brown thornbills.

A Welcome Swallow perched on a fence at Churchill Island

A Swamp Wallaby drinks water from Swan Lake (only freshwater lake on the island)

A juvenile Pacific Gull tries out a little freshwater

SPECIES LIST:

1. Chestnut Teal

2. Cape Barren Goose

3. White-Faced Heron

4. Little Black Cormorant

5. Little Pied Cormorant

6. Australian Pelican

7. Dusky Moorhen

8. Purple Swamphen

9. Silver Gull

10. Pacific Gull

11. Galah

12. Laughing Kookaburra

13. Superb Fairy-Wren

14. Brown Thornbill

15. Grey Shrike-Thrush

16. White-Plumed Honeyeater

17. Little Wattlebird

18. Red Wattlebird

19. Little Raven

20. Silvereye

21. House Sparrow

22. Eurasian Starling