Weekends That Were - April 2025

1.4.25

Minnippi

Nope its not an April Fool’s Day joke – I did go out birding alone again.

Another damp soggy, muggy, overcast morning. We have had extensive rain over the last few weeks and were expecting more within 24 hours. The ground was saturated and quite boggy underfoot with patches of ‘flood water’ to walk through, but my Gortex lined Zamberlains handled it perfectly and kept my feet dry. (Looking for some sponsorship here…). Even the M1 track was wet – a rare occurrence.

It was pretty quiet and, in fact, I only totaled 36 species, well below my average list for Autumn of 45 species. Virtually no Honeyeaters, only a few Lewin’s clicking away, but towards the far end of the M1 track, while fending off the hordes of flesh-eating mosquitoes, an Eastern Yellow Robin was calling away somewhere in the undergrowth – that call that drives everyone mad cause they sit dead still when they do it.

The lake was quiet with no egrets or cormorants on the water and only a few Pacific Black Ducks, Australian Wood Ducks and 1 Australian Grebe. I did have a Buff-banded Rail near the carpark and a pair of White-breasted Woodswallows on the wires. 

An interesting record, however, was a single Oriental Dollarbird on the overhead wires. This was the first one I had ever seen in April – out of 90 Autumnal recorded visits since 2002. All of my previous records were prior to mid-March and I wondered if this guy got held up by the very wet weather further north?

The only other things of any sort of interest were a flock of 9 Rainbow Bee Eaters passing overhead and a glide-past of a, presumed female due to size, Brown Goshawk.

7.4.25

Oxley

The track was fucking dead. That may have been due to my late start – I was on site at 7.15. 

It was a bright, clear, sunny morning but still little activity. I did end up seeing all three Fairy-wren species but all female or heavily moulting males, apart from one Red-backed male.

The ponds were dead as – 3 Dusky Moorhens, an Australian Darter and 1 Australian Pelican. There were about 20 Eastern Cattle Egrets hanging around the cattle and I did have a Plumed/Intermediate Egret and a White-faced Heron near the Red Shed, but all in all 34 species was a very low morning’s count.