Sludgie-that's-Mudgee

I'm thinking back to Australia today! Here's another vignette from last summer's trip.

At the beginning of our trip, Jim bravely drove us out of the Sydney airport and headed for Glen Davis, en route to Bowra Station, using my 20-year-old map of New South Wales. The road system around Sydney had undergone a few changes in the past two decades. With our map proving unreliable, we steered west by the sun, and finally admitted that we needed a bit of guidance to find the right road to Mudgee and, beyond, to Glen Davis.

The road to Glen Davis (Photo by Narca)

We rounded a corner and were waved over by two policemen. One shoved an instrument that looked like a handheld radio in front of Jim's face and said, "OK mate, one-to-five." Jim looked confused. I interpreted, "He wants you to count."

"Oh...uh...one-two-three-four-five... Can I ask if this is the road to Mudgee?"

That simple question unleashed an exchange worthy of Saturday Night Live. "Me 'n' my mate, we're from Sydney, they just send us up here where it's too cold.... So you want to go to Sludgie... that's Mudgee.... Hey, do you know if this is the way to Sludgie-that's-Mudgee?" And so they cartwheeled through a 10-minute comedy routine that left us in no doubt as to their true calling. It ended with "Enjoy Sludgie-that's-Mudgee! We have to get back to work."

We enjoyed Sludgie-that's-Mudgee, but we enjoyed Glen Davis even more. The little-traveled road to Glen Davis winds through miles of eucalypt forest. At one dry stream crossing, several Superb Lyrebirds raced and flew back and forth across the road, much more concerned with their own urgent business than with four optic-laden humans.

Common Bronzewings (Photo by Noel Snyder)

Near the crest of a hill, flowering Eucalyptus trees were drawing in scores of nectar-feeding lorikeets and honeyeaters, and among them was a real prize––a spectacular yellow-black-and-white Regent Honeyeater. Masses of Sulphur-crested Cockatoos filled the valley. Each turn of the road brought another discovery: Common Bronzewings; Australian Pipits; multicolored finches; Red-rumped Parrots.

The hospitable village of Glen Davis has a small campground, complete with hot showers, where visitors may camp for free. Australian King Parrots and Brown Treecreepers greeted these four weary travelers.

Australian King Parrot (Photo by Narca)

Stumpy

Papuan Frogmouth at LotusBird Lodge (Photo by Narca)

On our southward journey back down the Cape York Peninsula, we take a long side-loop from Musgrave, stopping first at LotusBird Lodge, where Sue shows us a Papuan Frogmouth in her yard and gives us great tips on where to find several very local bird species. We also ask about crocodiles.

Australia has two species of crocodiles, the Freshwater (Freshie) and the Saltwater (Saltie). Salties grow much larger, and both can occur in the same river system, although they aren't very good at sharing.

Sue responds to our question: "Oh––well, there's Stumpy. We just saw him a few days ago. He's a Freshie, and he had a run-in with a Saltie, and lost his left hand. But it's all healed over. That's why we call him Stumpy."

We follow Sue's directions to a spot along 5-Mile Creek. The drive is challenging, especially considering that this is basically flat country. Alan and Jim elect to bird near the car, while Noel and I head upstream in search of Stumpy––cautiously. By now we've heard many tales of tourists becoming lunch for a Saltie. We pass scrape marks left in the sand by sunning crocodiles. I see one six-footer drop from the far bank into a big pool and swim at the surface straight towards us, before disappearing into the depths with a rolling dive. At the very next pool, we find Stumpy.

If you were hiking here, would you see Stumpy? (Photo by Narca)

Stumpy has hauled out and is sunning. His eye is bright, and he doesn't move as we carefully walk *just a little* closer. His healed foreleg is plain to see. But it's odd that he's letting us approach.

We circle around and see that Stumpy has much bigger problems than two humans sharing his riverbank. He has obviously had another encounter with a Saltie (perhaps the one in the pool just downstream), and has lost his entire right foreleg, and has a deep gash in his hindleg. With wounds so grievous, it is hard to see how he can survive.

Stumpy, a Freshwater Crocodile (Photo by Narca)

Noel and I return to the lower pool and sit on the bank, at a very respectful distance, and wait, hoping that the Saltie will reappear. We are silent. The sleepy afternoon seems deeply peaceful. The incessant sound of cicadas lulls us. A big goanna rustles leaves on the far bank. Double-barred Finches come in to drink. Yet beneath that seeming peace hangs an ominous threat, lurking below the surface, out of sight yet palpable, a shadow cast in our minds by the hidden Saltwater Crocodile. The moment is complex and deep.

The Magnificent Riflebird

Magnificent Riflebird displaying (Photo by Jim Shiflett)

The loud whistles of displaying male riflebirds cut through the rainforest of the Iron Range on the Cape York Peninsula. Largest of Australia's birds of paradise, the Magnificent Riflebird ranges from northeast Australia to New Guinea. Males are a velvet black, with a shimmering blue-green bib and throat. (The angle to the light determines the exact color that's reflected.)

Male riflebirds claim a display perch on a horizontal limb or the top of a broken stump and solicit the attention of females with loud whistles and a hopping dance. Jim was impressed by a film he recently saw depicting these "lovemasters" and is particularly focused on finding one, which he does.

Not far from the road, a male is displaying from an unusually low horizontal branch, only 8 or 10 feet above the ground. Through a scope we watch the undulations of his glistening breast as he whistles and dances. The next day, Jim and Noel spend hours in quiet concealment near the male, photographing his glittering moves.

When a brown-backed female appears, the male shifts his intensity into high gear, crisply flashing and arching his extended wings, head thrown back, dazzling the female with his shimmering iridescence. If he's impressive enough for the choosy lady, they will mate, and soon he'll be back on his perch whistling for another paramour.

The intensity reminds me of a penguin's ecstatic display––and what better term is there for what this riflebird is doing?!

The Iron Range

Heathland of the Iron Range (Photo by Narca)

The Iron Range... what does that name conjure for you? For me it's synonymous with remoteness, a place of mystery, a place with rich interweaving of viney rainforest, heathlands, and mangrove-fringed tropical beaches. Its fabled birdlife crisscrosses the Torres Strait between wintering grounds in Papua New Guinea and breeding grounds on the Cape York Peninsula. In this region of only two seasons––drought and flood––access by road is impossible for months at a time. The Iron Range! The timing of our entire trip to Australia has pivoted around being able to get to this place.

After we leave the main Peninsula Developmental Road with its clouds of red dust, washboard, and speeding drivers, the road east leads through progressively lusher forest and hills, until we're back in the rainforest haunts of cassowaries. We aim for Chili Beach, arrive after dark, and set up camp. The night is warm and humid, and the surfsound lulling, as we drift into sleep.

Chili Beach (Photo by Narca)

Morning brings us the first of the Iron Range's fabulous specialties––a huge, black Palm Cockatoo flies right over our camp. Jim tracks it into a Beach Almond, where it is unobtrusively perched near the treetop, gnawing the almond-like fruits and seeds. He finds it by the sprinkle of vegetable bits falling onto the path.

Palm Cockatoo at Chili Beach (Photo by Narca)

The Butterflies of Oz

Male Cairns Birdwing (Photo by Narca)

We weren't in Australia at the best season for butterflies to be on the wing, yet a few were flying in the tropical northeast, and the butterfly house at Kuranda gives splendid photo ops at any time, of several showy species, including the spectacular Cairns Birdwing. Birdwings are in the swallowtail family.

Most of Australia's 416 butterfly species live in the rainforest, monsoon forest, and other moist habitats of the northern and eastern rims of the continent. The vast, dry interior has many fewer species.

Black Jezebel on bottlebrush (Photo by Narca)

Whites and sulphurs are gorgeously represented by the jezebels. We found Black Jezzies from the base of Mt. Lewis, to Inskip Point, to the Iron Range. Most were nectaring on flowering eucalypts.

Harlequin Metalmark in Iron Range (Photo by Narca)

Those of you familiar with the stunning array of gemlike metalmarks in the American tropics may be surprised to learn that only a single metalmark occurs in Australia, the Harlequin, which we were lucky to find in the Iron Range.

Lesser Wanderers (Photo by Narca)

Lesser Wanderers are relatives of the familiar Monarch, and they were flying at Townsville Commons.

For a slide show of more Australian butterflies, click on the link to my art gallery––and enjoy!

Galahs in Every Light

A Gathering of Galahs (Photo by Narca)

Most of us grow jaded with what's familiar. However awesome the spectacle, however exquisite the trogon, once we've seen a hundred or a thousand, or twelve thousand, we eventually stop seeing––seeing––them. Noel is exceptional in this regard.

In Australia, Galahs gather with hundreds of their kind to chatter, and screech, and feed, and dangle acrobatically from telephone lines. These pink-and-gray cockatoos stalk around suburban lawns, hang out in trees and along railway tracks, descend on agricultural areas, and perch on snags to catch the early morning sun––and they do it across an entire continent.

Yet, for Noel, every Galah we see is the First Galah, new-minted and just arrived on planet Earth––and of course each one of them needs to be photographed. Our Aussie friends, jaded from a lifetime of living around Galahs, seem intrigued and (politely) amused when a flock of Galahs appears, and Noel grabs his camera. I try to explain: "The light's different now from what it was an hour ago when he photographed them. He's photographed Galahs at dawn, Galahs by noonlight, Galahs at dusk, Galahs by stormlight––but not yet Galahs by 9 AM light."

I think they looked more closely at those Galahs than they had for some time. Another person's enthusiasm can do that: it can reawaken our own wonder, and allow us to see freshly, with new eyes, with original eyes.

Galah by stormlight––now there's a subject for a painting!

Little Red Flying Foxes

Little Red Flying Fox  (Photo by Narca)

South of Musgrave on the Cape York Peninsula is a chittering, rustling, squabbling, aromatic colony of 2.5 million Little Red Flying Foxes––reportedly the largest flying fox colony in Australia.

We find our way to the edge of the colony. The bats are very close overhead, their fur glowing red in the evening light. With wings stretched, they groom their pelage. Youngsters cling to their mothers (and are left behind when their mothers leave for the night to forage on nectar and pollen).

As dusk grows near, we return to open country and watch the bats in broad dispersal across the evening sky. These pollinators must service half of Cape York!

Little Red Flying Foxes (Photo by Narca)

Finally, as the vast star field of the southern sky stretches overhead––very brilliant in this isolated region––we drive towards our camp, and are surprised to see mobs of flying foxes drifting just above us through the forest, seeking flowering eucalypts. When they find a flowering tree, they cling to the branches to sip nectar. Outbreaks of chattering tell us where they are congregating.

I feel as if I'm underwater, looking up at a strange river, as the bats flow rustling overhead, through the treetops.

The Powerful Owl

Powerful Owl on Mt. Coot-tha (Photo by Narca)

Our friend John Coons, a leader for Field Guides, has given us a tip about where to find a Powerful Owl: the track at Mt. Coot-tha near Brisbane. We arrive there and find a whole maze of trails, none of them seeming to match John's description of the place. So... what to do?

It's early morning in eastern Australia; mid-afternoon––yesterday––in Arizona. I pull out my cell phone and it works! "Hi, John, this is Narca."

"Where are you?!" "Australia, on the top of Mt. Coot-tha, and we're confused." Soon John has set us straight, and we are climbing a trail alongside a stream, an excited Noel in the lead. He is first to spot the owl.

A bird of of great dignity, the Powerful Owl is unperturbed by our adoration and photo-taking. It's in a quintessentially Australasian genus of owls, the Ninox. Ninox owls are quite unusual, not only in their proportions, but in the fact that the males of the three largest Ninox species (including the Powerful Owl) are larger than the females. Usually it's the other way around in raptors.

Biologists have advanced many theories to try to explain the usual larger size of female raptors, but Noel says that they nearly always ignore the big exception to the rule: the three Ninox owls. He thinks that understanding the exception holds the key to our understanding the basis for the entire phenomenon of female raptors being larger than male raptors. I'm intrigued by that insight.

Aboriginal art on Mt. Coot-tha (Photo by Narca)

Of Pythons and Flying Foxes

Spectacled Flying Foxes in Cairns (Photo by Narca)

Cairns in Queensland is justly famous for offering splendid birding along its Esplanade and excellent diving and snorkeling along the Great Barrier Reef. Not everyone, however, knows about the colony of huge bats––Spectacled Flying Foxes––that roosts in the large trees on the grounds of Cairns' main public library.

Wherever colonial animals gather, their predators aren't far away. We've heard intriguing rumors of Amethystine Pythons haunting the flying fox colony at the library. Who wouldn't want to see a snake with a name like that?!

Finding the bats is no problem. Any of several senses (vision, hearing, smell) leads us right to them. But the snake proves tougher, and it is hard to imagine where on these grounds a large snake might conceal itself well enough to live into magnificent old age.

Jim, ever the intrepid explorer and seeker-of-knowledge, sets out to find answers, starting in the obvious place––the library. Libraries have reference librarians, after all. As closely as I can reconstruct the conversation secondhand, it goes something like this:

Jim: "We've heard that the bat colony outside attracts pythons. Would you know where we might see one?"

Librarian: "There aren't any snakes here," in her best stern voice.

Jim: "But someone who'd seen one here...."

Librarian: "I've been here 20 years. If we'd ever had a snake here, I would have heard about it."

Jim: "But..."

Librarian: "No snakes!!"

Jim retreats, but later returns with another question. A different librarian sees him approaching and, holding up her hand to ward him off, exclaims simply, "NO!" delivered at a volume you don't often hear in libraries.

Undeterred, Jim finds the Aboriginal groundskeeper and asks him about seeing pythons. This man takes the question completely in stride and muses, "Not here. But you could try the mangroves."

So the flying foxes at the Cairns public library seem to have chosen their python-free dayroost with considerable wisdom and forethought.

Flying Fox Mosaic at the Cairns Esplanade (Photo by Narca)

Lamington's Ancient Forest

Tree fern in Lamington's forest (Photo by Narca)

Lamington National Park's system of hiking trails penetrates the ancient, mossy Antarctic Beech forest, a relict from deeptime––from the misty, long-ago era of Gondwanaland. Antarctic Beech, a species of Nothofagus, is related to our oak trees, although they are no longer considered to be in the same family. The presence of Nothofagus species in Australia, New Zealand, New Guinea, Argentina and Chile, plus Nothofagus fossils in Antarctica, gives us strong botanical evidence of the ancient fusion of these southern continents.

Giant Brush Box tree (Photo by Narca)

Jim and I hike a 10-mile circuit that immerses us in Lamington's immensely old Nothofagus forest, before dropping into a spectacular valley of waterfalls. The trail eventually loops past other giants at a lower elevation––1500-year-old Giant Brush Box trees, whose limbs reach high into the sunlit canopy. Along the trail, a female Paradise Riflebird (one of the birds of paradise) forages in a leaf cluster, high up in one of the forest giants. An irruption of bewildering sounds betrays the presence of an Albert's Lyrebird, digging for morsels behind a fallen log. Lyrebirds are among the world's finest mimics.

Glossy Black Cockatoo in Casuarina (Photo by Narca)

From the World Heritage Site of Lamington, we descend into the lowlands via Duck Creek, a route that puts our 4WD rental car through its paces. Along the way, a cooperative pair of Glossy Black Cockatoos dines on woody Casuarina fruits, one of their favorite foods.

Bowra Station's Falcons and Parrots

Sunset along the Mitchell Highway (Photo by Narca)

Australian skies are brilliant, and their sunrises and sunsets magnificent. One such sunset graces the evening as we approach Bowra Station.

Bowra Station in southern Queensland, near the town of Cunnamulla, has become justly famous in birding circles for the rare species that thrive there. The owners, Ian and Julia McLaren, are selling Bowra to the Australian Nature Conservancy, so its management is now in a period of transition. Visitors may camp there, for a small fee.

Birding at Bowra Station (Photo by Narca)

Our first morning at Bowra, we enjoy the company of Aussie birders Roger and Greg. As everyone is standing around chatting, a family group of four Gray Falcons flies in, at first directly overhead, then spiraling in great circles till they are very high and distant. Gray Falcons are exceedingly rare; one of our new friends has been looking for the species for 40 years. And here they are. Birding has moments like that, and when such a moment comes after 40 years of searching, it is sweet indeed.

Bourke's Parrot (Photo by Narca)

During our two days at Bowra, other very interesting local species also cooperate: Chestnut-breasted Quail-Thrush; Hall's Babbler; White-browed Treecreeper––and Bourke's Parrot. We have given up on the parrot, having tramped through miles of country under the mulga trees, when Jim glimpses two of them flying up from the grass into a tree. Bourke's Parrots are lovely, subtly-colored grass parrots, rarely seen.

Tawny Frogmouth at Bowra Station (Sketch by Narca)

Platypus at Eungella and Yungaburra

Platypus at Eungella National Park (Photo by Narca)

Eungella National Park in Queensland encompasses lovely montane forest where pools of the Broken River support a thriving population of Platypus, one of Australia's two monotremes (egg-laying mammals). We arrive at the visitor center in late afternoon and hike a short way to a beautiful upper pool fringed in rock at one end. From the rocks, we overlook the water, where a Platypus dives, rolls, filters water at the surface with its odd leathery bill, and eventually, in the gathering dusk, swims directly below my perch on the rocks.

Early next morning, we return to the Broken River and see four of the little charmers. One emerges from the river and waddles swiftly over a sandbar and under a bank, startling a White-faced Heron as it brushes past. Platypus are nocturnal and crepuscular–they emerge in the hours around dusk to forage for invertebrates, and return to their burrows in the early morning hours.

Another very good place to look for Platypus is the river running through the village of Yungaburra in the Atherton Tablelands. The town has provided access and a trail along the river.

The Language of Oz

Young Wedge-tailed Eagle (Photo by Narca)

The Australian language is hauntingly like–and unlike–its American counterpart. We immediately begin to play with the slang. If you happen to drive past a wedgie (Wedge-tailed Eagle) or a tree full of cockies, just chuck a U-ey, mate, and you'll be right. We must have chucked hundreds of U-eys. Then one night at a little restaurant in Musgrave, the TV announcer in the background mentions that some ball player had "chucked a sickie." Jim investigates: the player had taken a day of sick leave! That must have caused some of his fans to "crack a mental" or "throw a wobbly!"

Australia, June & July 2009

Galah, an Australian Cockatoo (Photo by Narca)

Alan and I just returned from 5 weeks in Australia (followed by a week of butterflying and clamming in the Pacific Northwest) with our friends Noel Snyder and Jim Shiflett. We camped the entire time, except for the last night before our flight back and two nights on Artemis Station in the remote outback of Cape York. It’s easy to do a camping vacation in Australia, since so many of their “caravan parks” have showers and laundry.

A major highlight was our stay with the Shepherds on Artemis Station, which was arranged by Noel's friend Joe Forshaw, Australia's parrot expert. The Shepherds welcomed us into their home, and we exchanged stories into the night, seated around their large dining table. Early in the morning, a Black-backed Butcherbird flew through the open windows and landed on a chairback, awaiting a handout. Laughing Kookaburras greeted the sunrise from the clothesline. A flock of 200 Galahs nibbled grass seeds in the front yard.

Black-backed Butcherbird at Artemis Station (Photo by Narca)

Male Golden-shouldered Parrot at Artemis Station (Photo by Narca)

Artemis is home to the endangered and very beautiful Golden-shouldered Parrot. Sue Shepherd has observed and monitored the parrots for many years, and all of us old field hands were highly impressed by her expertise and the subtlety of her perception. She spent two mornings in the field with us, seeking out parrots. This time of year (July) the "chickens" have all fledged, and parrot families are hanging out unobtrusively with small mixed flocks. The young have a soft vocalization, but the adults are more often silent. Sue's technique is to look first for the flock's sentry birds: Rainbow Bee-eaters and Gray-crowned Babblers. They are much easier to spot!

Rainbow Bee-eater in mangroves, Townsville (Photo by Narca)

In the photo below, Sue is showing us a recently-used parrot nest in a "witch's hat" termite mound. The termites were walling off the nest entrance, and soon it won't be visible. If the parrots nest in too large a termite colony, the termites can wall off the entrance too quickly, and seal the young inside. So nesting is tricky business!

Sue Shepherd with us at a parrot nest (Photo by Narca)