G’day,
Oct 14th. After spending four days at Bilung Pool we turned south and headed back to the Murchison River and Ballinyoo Pool. It is 210 crow flying kilometres between the two pools with Murchison Settlement in-between at 75 kms north of the Murchison River. As you may recall I skipped the birds of Ballinyoo Pool in the interest of pursuing wildflowers. It is now time to return to the birds and move back in time to:
Sept 23rd, 2015. We arrived at Ballinyoo Pool after leaving the Wreath Flowers just north of Pindar earlier in the day and traveling via Twin Peeks cattle station. We set up camp on the Murchison River next to a mile long pool of water along a rough track east of the bridge and on the north side of the river. Note that our TV satellite dish is pointing at a bearing of 61° which is where the Optus C1 satellite is from here. These days , if the location suites, I set the van up with the Toyota facing roughly south west so that I don't need to take the satellite dish tripod off its swivel stand and place it on the ground. This spot was perfect as our outside dining area faced directly down the river and placed us only a few feet from nesting Budgerigars and Zebra Finches who fortunately didn't mind our presence or Bonnie's for that matter. Pointing east west and facing south is ideal from the point of view of maximising shade. Just a few steps to obtain a bucket of water and our kayak tied up to the bank directly below. All very handy I must say.
img-0765 Ballinyoo Pool camp site
September is the middle of the breeding season for many birds and this year rain had fallen providing plenty of food and consequently many birds were busy breeding. I managed to capture many photos of birds in nests with chicks and birds busy building nests and all the other activities associated with raising chicks. I hope you enjoy the following selection and subsequent editions.
The pool is about 1.5 kms long following good rains up stream and is created by the floodway across the road being higher than the riverbed. We spent many an hour paddling up and down the river in our kayak and I managed to capture a few good photos of birds from the kayak including the following Fairy Martin homes. These nests were directly below our caravan. The birds were not in the slightest bit disturbed by our close presence.
img-0775 Fairy Martin and mud nests
The local Fairy Martin population had built hundreds upon hundreds of their mud nests under every available ledge. Watching them collect a beak full of mud and bring it back to add to the nest was interesting. Each dollop was about the size of a pea. It must take many hundreds of trips to build their quite large nest which incidentally is also their home when not breeding. Although I took dozens of photos in rapid succession I was unable to capture a bird adding mud to a nest.
img-0768 Fairy Martin
img-0771 Fairy Martin
img-0778 Budgerigar female
Outside her nest, the hollow on the left.There is more of this bird and her mate, seen below, later.
The Finch pair built a nest only a few feet from the budgies nest, both in hollows. More later.
img-0795 Australian Pelican
img-0796 Whistling Kite
img-0798 Whistling Kite
img-0800 Peewit chicks in their exquisite mud nest.
img-0802 Peewit chicks
The chicks were exercising their wings in readiness to fly the coop.
img-0805 A regular treat.
img-0815 Reflections
The river looks extremely placid in this photo but there have been occasions when the river is a mighty river. At 820 kms long it is the second longest river in WA after the Gascoyne River and in 2006, following a cyclone, the river was 20 kms wide in places. Signs on the road indicate it was about two kms wide at this point. Down stream are the mighty Kalbarri Gorges.
img taken from the net Kalbarri Gorge in flood
img-0811.1 Zebra Finch
img-0812 Zebra Finch
img-0817 An exposed "Mallee-root"
An exposed large bulbous woody structure called a lignotuber that is
normally underground. The top soil has been scoured away during periods
of flooding exposing the roots or in this case the mallee-root. Many trees along the river bank show
signs of scouring (see imgs- 0826 & 0841 ).
img-0821 Spider web
img-0822 Perentie tracks
Heading to the river for a drink
Heading to the river for a drink
img-0826 Exposed roots
img-0828 Bottlebrush
img-0830 Bottlebrush
img-0833 Everlastings
img-0835 White-plumed Honeyeater
img-0837 White-plumed Honeyeater
 |
| img-0841 Eroded tree roots |
img-0841 Peregrine Falcon
img-0844 Peregrine Falcon
If you look carefully in the above two images you might be able to see that the Falcon has food for her chicks in her right talon - another birds baby chick.
img-0847 White-faced Heron
You will see more of this bird & her chick later. Currently she is sitting on an egg
If only I had been a tad quicker or more alert?
With meal in hand (so to speak)
img-0862 Bottlebrush
img-0864 Bottlebrush
img-0865 Everlastings
img-0866 ???
img-0871 Peregrine Falcon Chick
img-0882 Campsite
img-0891 Two-lined Dragon
img-0901 Peregrine Falcon
img-0903 Peregrine Falcon
img-0910 White-plumed Honeyeater + Bottlebrush
img-0911 Bottlebrush
img-0912 White-plumed Honeyeater + Bottlebrush
img-0916 White-plumed Honeyeater + Bottlebrush
img-0917 Yellow-plumed Honeyeater + Bottlebrush
same tree
 |
| img-0923 White-faced Heron |
img-0924 White-faced Heron
img-0926 Bonnie full of life
img-0932 Peregrine Falcon Chicks
img-0934 Peregrine Falcon Chicks
img-0936 Peregrine Falcon Chicks
img-0943 Twenty Eight drinking
img-0962 Zebra Finch male
img-0964 Weiro male
img-0968 Zebra Finch nest
This is a Zebra Finch nest within a Whistling Kite nest. There are at least five Finches in this photo including one on the wing and one peeking out of its nest.
mg-0970 Zebra Finch nest
img-0976 Whistling Kite same nest as above photos
The owner of the nest where the Finches have taken up home. Nesting in the Whistling Kites nest must provide security for their chicks from marauding birds of prey. We saw a dozen or more Whistling Kite nests and they all had one or more Finch nests. I wonder why the Kite lets them live in peace? Maybe they have a symbiosis relationship whereby the Finches keep the Kite nest free of parasites and the kite keeps marauding birds of prey away?? Except Finches are seed eaters!
img-0981 Mulla Mulla
The Dotterel below is feigning an injury by holding her wing up in the air as if it was broken and leading us away from her nest. She did a good job 'cause we couldn't find her nest. Like Plovers Dotterels build an unremarkable nest. Its an itty-bitty scrape in the ground.
img-0986 Red-kneed Dotterel
img-0987 Red-kneed Dotterel
img-0991 Budgerigar female
img-0992 Reflections
img-0994 River Gum
img-0996 Crested Pigeon
img-1004 Weiro male
img-1001 Weiro female or juvenile
img-1013 Twenty Eight male
Eyeing off a potential nest
img-1015 Black-tailed Native-hen
img-1021 Whistling Kite
Collecting nesting material
img-1022 Whistling Kite
img-1023 Whistling Kite
img-1024 Whistling Kite their nest
img-1027 Whistling Kite
His? mate keeping a careful eye on his nest building technique.
The preceding 80 odd photos were selected from a potential 265 photos that in-turn were selected from, maybe, 700 to a thousand or more taken over a six day period. There's only 560 more pictures taken (and retained) to review and choose from to complete the Ballinyoo bird series, many not seen in this or previous blogs. Ballinyoo Pool has proven to be a bird watchers and photographers paradise.
This brings to an end:
Travelogue 2015/2 The Birds of Ballinyoo Pool #10 Part 1
This brings to an end:
Travelogue 2015/2 The Birds of Ballinyoo Pool #10 Part 1
Geoff
mmmmmmmm
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