Birding Cairns
Birding Cairns is a local bird-watching club based in Cairns, N.E.Queensland, Australia. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Also hosting the Cairns Birding Forum http://cairnsbirding.blogspot.com/ and Michaelmas Cay Report http://michaelmascay.blogspot.comFriday, July 24, 2009
Festival Cairns Birding
CAIRNS 24HR BIRD RACE
Sep 5, 2009 Be There.
- a part of -
FESTIVAL CAIRNS BIRDING
Aug 21 - Sep 6. 2009
www.festivalcairnsbirding.blogspot.com
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Kingfisher Park & Mt Lewis, 19th July 2009.
We had a good Birding Cairns club outing today, with 19 people to share it. We met outside the front gate of Kingfisher Park (just over 200m a.s.l.) at 0730hrs because that is where the sun hits at that time of day. And we needed the sun after a cold foggy Tablelands morning. Keith Fisher met us there and much socialisation began but good birding soon eclipsed that.
Orange-footed Scrubfowl, Whistling & Black Kites, Bar-shouldered Dove, Brown Cuckoo Dove, Sulphur-crested Cockatoo, Scaly-breasted & Rainbow Lorikeets, Laughing Kookaburra, and Forest Kingfisher started off our list of seen and/or heard non-passerines for the day.
And the passerines seen in front of K Park was good too. Lewin's, Yellow-spotted, Graceful, Yellow-faced, Yellow, Dusky, Scarlet, White-throated, and Mcleay's Honeyeaters were all there (yes, K Park is on the ecotone between wet schlerophyll and rainforest). And Figbird, Olive-backed Oriole, Drongo, Spectacled Monarch, Pale-yellow Robin, Silvereye, Mistletoebird, Sunbird, made up list.
From there to the base of Mt Lewis we identified Pacific Black Duck, Grey Goshawk, Masked Lapwing, and Bee-eater; and especially in a short patch of rainforest at Ck, Satin Bowerbird, Brown Gerygone, Varied Triller, Grey & Rufous Whistlers, Little Shrikethrush, Bower's Shrikethrush, Yellow-breasted Boatbill, and female-plumaged Victoria's Riflebird were mostly seen very well.
We stopped here and there up the long, winding road to Mt Lewis (about 100m a.s.l.) seeing or hearing Noisy Pitta, White-throated Treecreeper, Spotted Catbird, Mountain Thornbill, Bridled Honeyeater, Chowchilla, Eastern Whipbird, and Grey-headed Robin along the way. The pitta and many calling Yellow-breasted Boatbills were a feature of the lower slopes while all the remainder were in the upper half of the mountain.
Around the top clearing were many Bridled Honeyeaters and Mountain Thornbills calling but very few new species. A few Eastern Spinebills. one Yellow-throated Scrubwren, one White-cheeked Honeyeater, and one Grey Fantail. It was very dry underfoot with a cold wind. Most of the group walked up the left side track and saw one Wompoo, one female Golden Bowerbird, one Fernwren, and one Atherton Scrubwren in the first 300m. After that there didn't seem to be much at all.
To make up for the lack of birds on top a few of us called into K Park on the way home and saw the Owlet-nightjar perched in its little stump-hole by Geraghty Park (thanks Keith for that), and David Anderson and I saw a probable Little Eagle slipping away over the trees south of Lake Mitchell, and stopped at Marsh's Marsh a little north of Mareeba to spot a Yellow-billed Spoonbill on a dead tree.
Andy A.
Next month, August 16, 0630 hrs, Wongabel SF, not far south of Atherton.
Then, from Aug 21 to Sept 6, a solid itinerary of daily birding activities; q.v. at www.festivalcairnsbirding.blogspot.com
Archives
December 2004 January 2005 February 2005 May 2005 October 2005 December 2005 June 2006 December 2008 July 2009 November 2009 December 2009 January 2010 January 2011 January 2013 February 2013
