2015 Bird Count

[platy]

They are lovely! The male feeding the female is courtship behaviour, that's really cool to see 8 is a good job for cold, snowy weather.

After all of yesterdays rain, today was quite sunny and my sister and I were just not having a good day. I couldn't get access to the computer software I needed at uni, my sister couldn't find any useful books for her research, a woman stopped dead in traffic in the middle of the highway right in front of us trying to turn right at a 'no right turn' zone and she wouldn't move! I wanted a coffee frappe but the shop was out of coffee So I just needed to turn the day around.

We stopped by the local botanic gardens for a quick wander and then I tripped on a bit of a gravel ditch in the path and twisted my ankle! Soon forgot about that when we were greeted by a duck with her last remaining duckling making their way to the pond. Baby animals can brighten anyones day.

The young Eurasian coots I saw a few weeks ago who were tiny little fluff balls have grown up so much, certainly not so little anymore!
The Australasian grebes have had some chicks. Absolutely adorable.
Also found a new holland honeyeater chick or more like fledgling I guess, begging for food from mum and dad. And some woodswallow chicks hanging out in their nest.

This is the Australasian grebe. I love their markings, which you can't really see in this picture because the bird was a bit far out and I only had my phone camera


And you can just make out one of the little chicks in the water. They had just moved off the nest, which is that browny/grey plant matter patch between the reeds. Incredibly small and incredibly cute, there were 3 in total following mum around waiting for food.


And then on the way back to the car I spotted this tiger snake along the edge of the footpath. I'd never seen a wild tiger snake before this, they're really quite beautiful. Since it was almost closing time and everyone would be walking down that path, my sister went back to tell the people working there that there was a snake in the area, whilst I waited and took photos of it lol. It still surprises me how scared people can be of snakes. It didn't care for the people around at all, it just wanted to cross the path to get to the other side of the bush. I can understand to some extent because I tend to feel that way about big spiders. I struggle to even look at them, but my first instinct isn't to kill them at it seems to be with people and snakes.


So that was my day.
51. Pacific black duck
52. Dusky woodswallow
53. New holland honeyeater
54. Australasian grebe