Broome 2007 part 9

Eastern Curlew

29th Expect to catch some Broad-billed Sandpiper today and possibly some Eastern Curlew. We do in fact make a modest catch of Eastern Curlew (5/2) using a large mesh 4-cannon net at Observatory Beach.

Eastern Curlew

Alice and her Eastern Curlew

Sue Abbotts and Ji Qui processing an Eastern Curlew

Eastern Curlew, the largest of all shorebirds, being weighed

Peter Jenkins struggling with the tough stainless band used for Eastern Curlew


Film crew and an Eastern Curlew film star!



Eastern Curlew C7 immediately after release

C7 takes off

30th Again on meal duty! Last day. A very early start to be down at Crab Creek by dawn for some passerine banding with Roz. We leave the mist nets up until it begins to warm up by about 0830.

Banding station at Crab Creek

Dusky Gerygone

Rufous-throated Honeyeater

Yellow White-eye

Mangrove Grey Fantail


Broad-billed Flycatcher

White-breasted Whistler

Mangrove leaves at Crab Creek

Our last team effort today is to set a large mesh 4-cannon cannon net at the port (Entrance Point) for an intended catch of terns but in the end we make a last moment decision to catch ten Sooty Oystercatcher, in fact the whole of the flock that was present on the beach at the time! One of them was a retrap. Of the terns we caught Common Tern (34), Lesser Crested Tern (5) and a Roseate Tern making a total catch of 50.

The infamous Grain Silo at Broome Port. We catch on the beach below

Ten Sooty Oystercatchers on the Port Beach

The net is fired at the last minute before the tide is about to surge over it

The Sooty Oystercatcher had been walking all over the net at the critical last moment when the tide was finally pushing the terns into the catching area! Some of the party will leave Broome today. It is the last night barbecue.

The fabulous Sooty Oystercatcher of the subspecies ophthalmica. This eye-ring condition also occurs in birds from the Great Barrier Reef - at least to as far south as Lady Elliot island. Is it a distinct population and might it be considered a distinct species as John McKean advocated many years ago?

Lesser Crested Tern

Osprey

The final expedition tally was 4046 birds processed (45 more than in 2006) including 107 terns. At Broome we caught 2261, including 415 retraps. At Anna Plains we caught 1785 of which 95 were retraps. Total catches for significant shorebirds (with % juveniles) came to: Great Knot 1412 (12.7%), Curlew Sandpiper 565 (28.7%), Bar-tailed Godwit 432 (6%), Greater Sandplover 268 (27.2%), Red-necked Stint 264 (20.5%), Grey-tailed Tattler 231 (24.7%), Terek Sandpiper 172 (12.8%), Red Knot 135 (23%) and Ruddy Turnstone 68 (27.2%).

Those who participated were:
Paul Barden, Yarhkat Barshep (Nigeria), Rachel Blakey, Alison Botha, Adrian Boyle, Bek Christensen, Maureen Christie, Vicki Cronan, John Curran, Xenia Dennett, Mandy Dey (USA), David Drynan, Dianne Emslie, Alice Ewing, Peter Fullagar, Zhang Guangming (China), Hugh Hanmer (UK), Chris Hassell, Dick Holmes (USA), Peter Jenkins, Rosalind Jessop, Li Jing (China), Justine Keuning, Brian Little (UK), David Melville (NZ), Julia Melville (NZ), Clive Minton, Ian & Halina Newton (UK), Larry Niles (USA), Frank O'Connor, Maurice O'Connor, Ma Qiang (China), Ji Qiu (China), Sue Rice (USA), Liz Rozenberg, David Smith, Andrea Spencer, Naoko Takeuchi (Japan), Nick Ward and Prue Wright.

Birds seen by me during this expedition: [Helmeted Guineafowl], Plumed Whistling Duck, Pacific Black Duck, Darter, Little Pied Cormorant, Pied Cormorant, Little Black Cormorant, Australian Pelican, White-faced Heron, Little Egret, Eastern Reef Egret, Great Egret, Striated Heron, Straw-necked Ibis, Australian White Ibis, Black-necked Stork, Osprey, Black-shouldered Kite, Black Kite, Whistling Kite, Brahminy Kite, White-bellied Sea-eagle, Spotted Harrier, Brown Goshawk, Wedge-tailed Eagle, Brown Falcon, Nankeen Kestrel, Brolga, Buff-banded Rail, Australian Bustard, Black-tailed Godwit, Bar-tailed Godwit, Little Curlew, Whimbrel, Eastern Curlew, EURASIAN CURLEW, Marsh Sandpiper, Common Greenshank, Wood Sandpiper, Terek Sandpiper, Grey-tailed Tattler, Ruddy Turnstone, Great Knot, Red Knot, Sanderling, Red-necked Stint, Sharp-tailed Sandpiper, Curlew Sandpiper, Broad-billed Sandpiper, Bush Stone-curlew, Pied Oystercatcher, Sooty Oystercatcher, Black-winged Stilt, Grey Plover, Red-capped Plover, Lesser Sandplover, Greater Sandplover, Oriental Plover, Masked Lapwing, Australian Pratincole, Silver Gull, Gull-billed Tern, Caspian Tern, Lesser Crested Tern, Crested Tern, Roseate Tern, Common Tern, Little Tern, Whiskered Tern, White-winged Black Tern, Crested Pigeon, Diamond Dove, Peaceful Dove, Bar-shouldered Dove, Red-tailed Black-cockatoo, Little Corella, Red-winged Parrot, Pallid Cuckoo, Brush Cuckoo, Horsfield’s Bronze-cuckoo, Pheasant Coucal, Tawny Frogmouth, Fork-tailed Swift, Sacred Kingfisher, Rainbow Bee-eater, Dollarbird, Variegated Fairy-wren, Red-backed Fairy-wren, Dusky Gerygone, White-throated Gerygone, Little Friarbird, Singing Honeyeater, Brown Honeyeater, Rufous-throated Honeyeater, Yellow Chat, Grey-crowned Babbler, Rufous Whistler, White-breasted Whistler, Grey Shrike-thrush, Broad-billed Flycatcher, Paperbark Flycatcher, Magpie-lark, Mangrove Grey Fantail, Willie Wagtail, Black-faced Cuckoo-shrike, White-winged Triller, Olive-backed Oriole, White-breasted Woodswallow, Black-faced Woodswallow, Pied Butcherbird, Australian Magpie, Torresian Crow, Great Bowerbird, Singing Bushlark, Australian Pipit, Yellow Wagtail, Double-barred Finch, Mistletoebird, Tree Martin, Golden-headed Cisticola and Yellow White-eye. A total of 121.

Species I know were seen by others included: Green Pygmy-goose, Grey Teal, Australasian Grebe, Lesser Frigatebird, Black-breasted Buzzard, Australian Hobby, Peregrine Falcon, Common Redshank, Asian Dowitcher, Long-toed Stint, Black-fronted Dotterel, Red-kneed Dotterel, Red-headed Honeyeater, Long-tailed Finch. An additional 14.

Of the regular species for the area (Broome and Anna Plains) as far as I know we did not record: Brown Quail, Wandering Whistling Duck, Pink-eared Duck, Hardhead, Hoary-headed Grebe, Brown Booby, White-necked Heron, Intermediate Egret, Glossy Ibis, Royal Spoonbill, Square-tailed Kite, Swamp Harrier, Collared Sparrowhawk, Little Eagle, Purple Swamphen, Eurasian Coot, Swinhoe’s Snipe, Common Sandpiper, Beach Stone-curlew, Red-necked Avocet, Pacific Golden Plover, Oriental Pratincole, Galah, Cockatiel, Rainbow Lorikeet, Budgerigar, Southern Boobook, Blue-winged Kookaburra, Red-backed Kingfisher, Black-tailed Treecreeper, Striated Pardalote, Mangrove Gerygone, White-gaped Honeyeater, Grey-headed Honeyeater, Yellow-tinted Honeyeater, Jacky Winter, Mangrove Golden Whistler and Zebra Finch. Others in the party may have seen some of these species. They are all reasonably easy to find given sufficient time to look for them in the appropriate places. These extra 38 species make up the overall total of 173 that could be expected for the area.

1st June. Pack up and leave but not before taking Ian and Halina Newton to Crab Creek in the early morning before it got too hot in an attempt to show them some of the typical species found at this site. We saw the White-breasted Whistler, Yellow White-eye, Mangrove Grey Fantail and several species of shorebirds and other waterbirds and a few raptors. I leave in the PM for Perth where I will stay in Guildford with Ian and Eleanor Rowley for the duration of the 4th Biennial Australasian Ornithological Conference, 3rd to 5th December. I return to Canberra by direct flight arriving late in the evening on Thursday 6th December.