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Friday, October 17, 2014

AUSTRALIA - HOLIDAY/RECCE TOUR - DAY 22 - OCT 18TH - CAIRNS

REDDEN ISLAND

Roly and Helen went off on a trip to the Barrier Reef whilst Dawn and I stayed home for a relaxing day. Back on the veranda of the tree-house I watched the local birds, an Osprey flew up carrying a fish and circled high over the hillside, I pondered on what the fish could be thinking? - having just been snatched from its watery-world into the suffocating air and taken to a great height before passing away, maybe he felt like an Hare Chrishna who is yanked into heaven by his pony tail just as he dies.
Welcome Swallow - a bit like a Barn Swallow

Looking up at a large number of White-rumped Swiftlets I noticed some all black swifts with deep forked tails, they turned our to be Fork-tailed Swifts, another lifer and a good bird for the area.


BLACK-NECKED STORK
Later in the morning we did venture the short distance to Redden Island and parked at the point where the Barron River flows into the Pacific. It was quite windy at times but that kept us cooler.


I walked onto the exposed sand and mud-bars and scoped a good variety of waders and notched up another lifer in the shape of a Greater Sand Plover. Back on the banks of the river a nice margin of mud became exposed and I scoped the far bank where the mangrove swamp came up to the edge of the water. There I added a few more birds for the trip list and two more lifers: Black-necked Stork (formerly Jabiru) and Beach Stone Curlew.


THE VIEW LOOKING BACK FROM THE MOUTH OF THE RIVER BARRON

GREATER SAND PLOVER

GREATER SAND PLOVER BEHIND A RED-CAPPED PLOVER -
I put this photo in to show the difference in sizes, the Red-capped is about the size of a Kentish Plover
COMMON TERN - RACE Longipennis
 

bird list from Redden island mud flats


EASTERN CURLEW
WHIMBREL
BAR-TAILED GODWIT
GREY-TAILED TATTLER
GREAT KNOT
MARSH SANDPIPER
RED-CAPPED PLOVER
PACIFIC GOLDEN PLOVER
GREATER SAND PLOVER
RED-NECKED STINT
SHARP-TAILED SANDPIPER

BLACK-NECKED STORK
BEACH STONE-CURLEW
STRIATED HERON

CASPIAN TERN
COMMON TERN
GULL-BILLED TERN

SILVER GULL

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