We had our first chance to do some legitimate birding on Kangaroo Island, right before leaving Adelaide. Like many islands, there are a number of endemic birds. Although we didn’t see the Glossy Black Cockatoos, we did manage to see Crescent Honeyeaters, Purple-gaped Honeyeaters, Pied and Sooty Oystercatchers, Silvereyes, Cape Barren Geese, and Little Penguins! We actually went on a tour to see the penguins, but it was a really excellent tour, and well-worth it. These penguins (the smallest penguin of all, hence the name) stay out at sea feeding all day. At night time, once their eggs have hatched and they have little chicks waiting in the nests, they return to feed their babies. Getting onto shore, however, is not easy and quite dangerous. Seals think little penguins make great dinners, and they are able to catch them when they get close to the surface as they come ashore. So, the penguins have to be careful and sneaky. Once they’re on shore, as long as they’re not being chased by a seal, the only thing they have to do is climb what must feel like Mt. Everest and feed their starving chicks. These penguins can only waddle, but they have to climb up steep, slippery rocks and cliffs in order to get to their nests. It takes them quite a while, and they seem to climb in spurts, resting regularly. However, they are amazingly cute to watch as they waddle up to a rock, and then hop up to the next spot.
They must have an incredibly strong desire to successfully pass on their genes, because the greeting they receive when they finally make it to the nest is not a friendly one. The chicks essentially mob the parents begging for food. It’s especially bad if there is only one parent, as the chicks really start to compete with each other for the food. All I can say is that if my kids attacked me after I had spent all day looking for food, risked being eaten by a seal, and then hiked up a serious mountain just to feed them, they would be learning to cook for themselves. In short, the penguin tour was excellent, and Dave and I stayed watching the penguins even after the guide left. In fact, we stayed until the flashlight battery started to die, and we could no longer see them in the dark. If you do get to Australia, and you want to see the Little Penguins, I can highly recommend the tour out of Penneshaw on Kangaroo Island. It does mean you have to get over to KI, but it’s a very informative, reasonably-priced tour run by the South Australian agency that does wildlife (I don’t actually know their name). It’s not an over-priced touristy gimmick, which I have a feeling some of the penguin tours might be.
After KI, our next birding adventure was Tasmania. Being relatively beginner-birders, Tassie was perfect because the possibilities are limited. If you see a small brownish bird with perhaps one noticeable characteristic, like a white line above and below the eye, you can identify it. Not because you got a really good look, but because there is only one possibility in Tassie. There are some pretty awesome birds there, including 12 endemics (of which we saw eight). The highlights were Green Rosellas, Yellow Wattlebirds, Tasmanian Native-hen (their call is really funny – it sounds like a squeaky bed…hee hee), the Scarlet and Flame Robins, and the Yellow-throated Honeyeater. We went on quite an adventure up a windy, narrow unsealed road at dusk looking for the Superb Lyrebird, but to no avail (the bird book describes them as shy and secretive—go figure).
However, we felt we more than made up for that by seeing two platypus, wombats, echidnas, wallabies, kangaroos, and pademelons (they look like fat hopping rats). In fact, the platypus might have been the highlight of the wildlife tour for me. We knew they were relatively difficult to see, mostly because they get scared off easily, and usually only come out at dawn and dusk during the summer months. We wanted to see one, but weren’t really too sure how we should go about it. We decided to stop at the Tamar Island wetlands (to look for birds), and saw that a platypus had been spotted there recently. We got to talking with the woman at the visitor centre, and she told us that we were unlikely to see one there, but that they were often spotted in La Trobe. Having a flexible plan, we decided that we would head to La Trobe that evening to try and see a platypus.
We drove into town looking for dinner, and saw a sign that said “The Trout and Platypus Experience”, with a fork and knife symbol next to it, indicating food was served there. We weren’t sure whether that meant they served trout and platypus, but we ended up following the signs there, in part because nothing else seemed open in La Trobe. We arrived at the building – the giant platypus sculpture outside the front made it relatively obvious (did you know that La Trobe is the platypus capitol of the world?). We headed in and ordered some dinner, which fortunately did not involve platypus. A couple came in soon after us, inquiring about where they should meet the guide for the platypus tour that evening. Well, one thing led to another, and we ended up joining the tour that evening, which was most excellent.
Similar to the Little Penguin tour in Penneshaw, this tour was very reasonably priced and was run by the local Landcare group. It was really an amazing story – some people in the group decided to clean up a section of the Mersey River, and create a lake (prime platypus habitat) out of what used to be a gravel pit. They did that 16 years ago, and within 12 months of them restoring the area, they had platypus arrive. Ever since, they’ve been running tours whenever people want to go (at an incredibly cheap cost of $10pp). In fact, I think there are perhaps one or two people who do the tours (can you imagine how many they must have done by now!). Incredibly, the guy who gave us the tour told us he had been unsuccessful in finding a platypus only three times in the last 15 years, one of which had been the previous evening.
Fortunately for us, Dave was paying attention, and he spotted bubbles across the lake. When the platypus come out, they’re foraging, which they do by going underwater, digging around in the rocks and vegetation, and coming back up for air before going down again. They slowly release bubbles when they’re underwater, which is a good way to find them. At first the platypus was out in the center of the lake, which made viewing a bit difficult. But, almost as if our tour guide had trained the platypus to do so, it came right over to the bank, and slowly made a circle around the lake. We were able to move a few steps forward every time she went under, and watched her as she made her way around.
Since I’m on the subject, I may as well talk about the only other monotreme, which we also saw in Tasmania: the echidna. These guys are sort of a cross between porcupines and ant eaters. Anyways, they look so funny because they have these really long noses (Dave calls them the original pinocchio). They dig for insects with their nose, so when you see them, they primarily have their faces shoved into the ground. Still, they are very cute, especially when they look up at you. And, apparently baby echidnas are sometimes called ‘puggles’. Hee hee.
Anyways, I know I just went on a complete monotreme detour there, but it sort of fit in with the wildlife viewing theme of the whole blog. Our final especially notable experience (except for the Satin Bowerbirds in the Blue Mountains near Sydney) was our trip to the Blackbutt Reserve near Newcastle. We went in search of koalas (so our friend Eleanor could see them), and were pleasantly surprised to find a wide sampling of Australian birds in the reserve. Now, we can’t officially count these birds on our life lists since we saw them in captivity, but I don’t really care because seeing them up close and in the open was absolutely amazing. In fact, I would encourage you to google an image of the Tawny Frogmouth. What a crazy bird! And we stood face to face with one – not more than two feet from it. We also got to see Gouldian Finches, which look like brightly colored Easter eggs, Turquoise Parrots, an Eclectus Parrot, Apostlebirds, King Parrots, and Emerald Doves, to name just a few.
Many of you might be wondering how we could have spent so much time looking through binoculars, but if you haven’t done it before, I highly recommend giving it a try. Birds in the wild are, well, wild.
