Rainbow Bee-eaters come visiting

Rainbow Bee-eater

One of my favourite Australian birds would have to be the Rainbow Bee-eater. This colourful bird with the rainbow colours is widespread through much of mainland Australia. We occasionally have them in our garden in Murray Bridge as visitors. They rarely stay more than a few minutes. I have heard and seen them on a few occasions over recent weeks.

This has not always been the case. Many years ago - probably about 20 or so years ago - they could be counted as a breeding species on our five-acre block of land. On several occasions, they made their small nest at the end of a 30-40cm burrow in the sand. These nests were made in the banks on the side of the road running down the western edge of our land. In more recent years, they have just been occasional visitors.

Rainbow Bee-eaters arrive in southern Australia in the spring months around September and October. During our spring and summer months, they dig their nests, often in the sides of roads, culverts or in the banks of creeks and wash-outs. They raise their young and then migrate back to northern Australia and Papua-New Guinea in the late summer or early autumn, usually around March or April.

Despite their name, Rainbow Bee-eaters eat more than just bees. They will catch a wide variety of insects on the wing. When they do catch a bee, they will alight on a branch of a nearby tree and proceed to remove the stinger of the bee by banging it on the branch. I guess that they just don't want their lunch to bite them.

You can read more about Australian birds on my other site called Trevor's Birding.

Rainbow Bee-eater

Diamond Firetail Finches, Capertee Valley

Diamond Firetail

On our visit last year to Sydney, we came home a different way. Instead of travelling straight home to Murray Bridge, we detoured via Lithgow, Mudgee, Dunedoo, Cobar and Broken Hill. From Lithgow to Mudgee we detoured through the Capertee Valley, one of the birding hotspots in Australia. This was my first visit to the valley. I was disappointed during our brief visit. I didn't see some of the rarer birds known to inhabit this amazing landscape of towering sandstone cliffs.

When we stopped for afternoon tea at the small village of Glen Alice, I was pleased to see a solitary Diamond Firetail Finch, the one shown in today's photos. This beautiful member of the finch family is good to see anywhere and we even have this species as an occasional visitor to our garden. This was the only occasion I saw this finch on this particular five week holiday in New South Wales. It was a fitting addition to my bird list for the trip, and one of the highlights of the day.

Diamond firetail

Diamond Firetail

Birding in the Capertee Valley in New South Wales

Capertee Valley, New South Wales, Australia

On our way back from visiting family in Sydney last year, we decided to take a different route. We love travelling in Australia and we especially love exploring new routes and new places. One such place I had longed to visit was the Capertee Valley, just north of Lithgow and only a few hours' drive north-west of Sydney.

We left our son's home after breakfast and travelled up through the Blue Mountains and past Katoomba. This is a lovely part of Australia and there are many wonderful places to stop along the way. We only stopped briefly for morning tea because I wanted to make the most of the birding opportunities in the Capertee Valley. This has been a magnet for many birders over many years. The scenery is also quite spectacular, as you can see in today's photos.

Capertee Valley, Australia

I actually misjudged the distances and time needed to fully explore this area. To make a full exploration of the region, and to actually get to see many of the wonderful birds resident in this area, birders need to spend at least a full day here, preferably several days to a full week. There is so much to see.

We stopped a short distance east of the village of Capertee for a picnic lunch. It was just after midday - not the best time of the day to be birding in Australia on a warm day. While we ate our lunch, I saw zero birds and only heard one in the distance - possibly one of the treecreeper species found in this area. We were off to a bad start. Driving slowly down the road the countryside opened up from forest to farmland. We started seeing a few Australian Ravens, Australian Magpies, White-winged Choughs and occasionally a few Galahs and Magpie Larks. I managed zero photos of these birds; they were too far away.

Eventually, I decided to stop to get a few photos of the magnificent sandstone cliffs bordering the valley. They were spectacular in the afternoon sun. As I was taking these shots - those shown above and below - a solitary bird flew from the grass and landed on a fence post about 50 metres from me. With the good zoom lens on my camera, I managed a photo, but it is far from good, even for identification purposes. I think it is an Australasian Pipit which is found in the area.

Australasian Pipit?

Over the next few hours, we explored some parts of this beautiful valley. Some of the photos I took are shown below. I will write again next week about some other birds I saw that afternoon.

For more stories about my sightings of Australian birds, and for more photos of them go to my other site Trevor's Birding.

Capertee Valley, Australia

Capertee Valley, Australia

Capertee Valley, Australia

Capertee Valley, Australia

A day at the beach

Silver Gull, Pt Elliott, South Australia

Recently my wife and I celebrated another milestone in our lives together. To mark the occasion we went driving down south from our home to the lovely South Coast of South Australia. This is just over an hour's drive from our home in Murray Bridge.

Our first stop was at the Milang Bakery to buy some lunch. We enjoyed eating our lunch on the lawn overlooking the nearby Lake Alexandrina. The mighty Murray River - Australia's largest river system - runs into this lake before moving out into the Southern Ocean.

After lunch, we explored Hindmarsh Island. This inland island is near Goolwa, and we stopped at a picnic spot on the island overlooking the Murray Mouth. There were plenty of pelicans, cormorants, a few ducks and several species of ibis as well as a few Cape Barren Geese, one of our rarer bird species.

For afternoon tea we had a cup of tea accompanied by some homemade biscuits. I choose a lovely spot overlooking Horseshoe Bay at Pt Elliott. This is a popular holiday destination for many people, and also with day-trippers like ourselves. While we were having our cuppa and enjoying the view, a Silver Gull posed nicely on a nearby interpretive sign. It stayed long enough for a series of photos, almost as if it was posing especially for me.

For dinner that night we went to one of our favourite restaurants in Victor Harbor. It was a fitting end to a relaxing day.

You can read more about Australian birds and see more photos of them on my other site, Trevor's Birding.

Silver Gull

Horseshoe Bay, Pt Elliott, South Australia

Horseshoe Bay, Pt Elliott, South Australia