Mar Birding

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March 30, 3:00 PM Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

While on the walk to the lighthouse we saw a raptor, then on the return trail through the rainforest we saw an Eastern Whipbird and 2 Grey Fantails.

  • Little Corella
  • Nankeen Kestrel (new for 2012)
  • Eastern Whipbird (new for 2012)
  • Grey Fantail (new for 2012).


March 29, 2:00 PM Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

We began the morning with a trip to Meldrum Park In Ballina but only saw a couple of Pied Oystercatchers.

Then we drove to Victoria Park west of Ballina. This is a semi-tropical rainforest reserve. The vegetation was very dense making the boardwalk relatively dark and photography difficult. 

We were able to identify 2 birds:

  • White-browed Scrubwren (first for 2012)
  • Pale-yellow Robin (LIFER)


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White-browed Scrubwren

The Pale-yellow Robin was our 200th distinct Australian species. Now we can relax.

Then we returned to Ballina in the pouring rain. This was the first real downpour since we arrived. But it was over when we stopped at Shelly beach for a nice lunch.

We ended our birding with another visit to Flat Rocks.

We identified the following birds:

  • Arctic Tern [LIFER]
  • Great Cormorant
  • Pied Cormorant
  • Ruddy Turnstone
  • Osprey
  • Silver Gull
  • Crested Tern
  • Little Tern
  • Eastern Reef Egret
  • Fairy Tern (first in 2012)
  • Lesser Crested Tern (first in 2012)
  • Common Tern
  • Red-capped Plover (first in 2012)


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Arctic Tern

This time I feel confident of the identification. The coloring is good, the legs are short, the bill is short and black, and the tail feathers are shorter than the wings.

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Pied Cormorants & Great Cormorant

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Ruddy Turnstone

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Lesser Crested Tern & Little Tern

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Red-capped Plover

The Arctic Tern was our 5th Australian Lifer for this trip, and our 200th different Australian species. Now to keep counting.



March 28, 11:50 am Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

We drove over to Lake Chickiba this morning and followed that with a stop at Flat Rock. The surprise here was to see a Royal Spoonbill among the Australian White Ibises. A further surprise was when I digitally zoomed in on a group of 4 birds on the far shore which we assumed were White Ibises and discovered they were Royal Spoonbills. We also saw a male Pacific Golden Plover in breeding plumage. It is going to take some serious work looking at the photos to identify some of the other waders.

While at Flat Rock a "real" birdwatcher arrived with spotting scope. She was counting the number of Common Terns and Crested Terns. We chatted for a few minutes and she told us that the terns we had identified as Arctic Terns were actually Common Terns. They do look very similar, but she said that Arctic Terns were fairly rare in this area. I will make the necessary changes to my database. She also suggested we try going to Weldrum Park in Ballina.

In the late afternoon we tried Weldrum Park but were disappointed to see almost no birds. We will try this again tomorrow morning.

Here is a list of the birds we saw today.

  • Australian White Ibis
  • Royal Spoonbill (new for 2012)
  • Great Egret
  • White-faced Heron
  • Little Egret (new for 2012)
  • Pacific Golden Plover
  • Curlew Sandpiper (new for 2012)
  • Sharp-tailed Sandpiper (new for 2012)
  • Bar-tailed Godwit
  • Common Sandpiper (LIFER)
  • Grey-tailed Tattler (new for 2012)
  • Willy Wagtail
  • Common Tern
  • Crested Pigeon
  • Corella


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Royal Spoonbill


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Sharp-tailed Sandpiper


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Bar-tailed Godwit


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Curlew Sandpiper


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Grey-tailed Tattler


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Grey-tailed Tattler with Pacific Golden Plovers


The Common Sandpiper was our third Australian Lifer for this trip, and our 199th different Australian species.



March 27, 11:00 am Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

We stopped at Flat Rock to take a few more photos of the birds. As we were walking to the rocks we were chatting with a local who asked if we going to take photos of the Arctic Terns. We said yes - but we later realized they were Common Terns.

Here is a list of the birds we saw:

  • Common Tern
  • Fairy Tern
  • Pied Cormorant
  • Sooty Oystercatcher
  • Ruddy Turnstone
  • White-fronted Tern
  • Crested Tern
  • Silver Gull


March 26, 12:30 PM Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

We spent the morning looking for birds along the dirt road behind Lake Ainsworth.

Here is a list of the birds we saw today:

  • Variegated Fairy-wren (new for 2012)
  • White-cheeked Honeyeater (new for 2012)
  • Noisy Friarbird
  • Rainbow Lorikeet
  • Scaly-breasted Lorikeet
  • Little Wattlebird
  • Lewin's Honeyeater (new for 2012)
  • Noisy Miner
  • Crested Pigeon
  • Magpie-lark


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White-cheeked Honeyeater


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Little Wattlebird


March 25, 1:30 PM Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

We then drove to Flat Rock beach and did a little birding. As soon as we entered the short path from the parking area to the beach a beautiful Superb Fairy-wren appeared right in front of us. In the evening we walked along the path by the Richmond River to its mouth. Along the way there were a number of sand bars that gave us an opportunity to see a number of waders and shore birds.

Here is a list of the birds we saw today:

  • Pacific Black Duck
  • Willy Wagtail
  • Noisy Friarbird (first for 2012)
  • Australian Raven
  • Superb Fairy-wren (first for 2012)
  • Ruddy Turnstone (first for 2012)
  • Little Tern (first for 2012)
  • White-fronted Tern (first for 2012)
  • Crested Tern
  • Common Tern (first for 2012)
  • Sanderling (first for 2012)
  • Pied Cormorant
  • Little Black Cormorant
  • Little Egret (new for 2012)
  • Black-tailed Godwit (new for 2012)
  • Pied Oystercatcher
  • Red-necked Stint (new for 2012)
  • Masked Lapwing
  • Bar-tailed Godwit (new for 2012)
  • Pacific Golden Plover (new for 2012)
  • Great Egret (new for 2012)
  • White-faced Heron
  • Darter
  • Rainbow Lorikeet
  • White Ibis
  • Spotted Turtle-dove


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Willy Wagtail


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Superb Fairy-wren


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White-fronted Tern


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Crested Tern


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Little Terns


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Common Tern




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Bar-tailed Godwit


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Rainbow Lorikeet

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Rainbow Lorikeet


The White-fronted Tern was the 50th different species that we have identified on this trip.



March 24, 3:00 PM Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

Here are the birds that we identified today:

  • Pied Oystercatcher (first for 2012)
  • Laughing Kookaburra
  • White-faced Heron (first for 2012)
  • Striated Heron (first for 2012)
  • Galah
  • Little Black Cormorant
  • Little Pied Cormorant (first for 2012)
  • Australian Pelican (first for 2012)
  • Little Wattlebird (first for 2012)
  • Darter (first for 2012)
  • Eastern Reef Egret (first for 2012)
  • Brush Turkey (first for 2012)
  • Great Cormorant (first for 2012)
  • Sooty Oystercatcher (first for 2012)
  • Black-bellied Storm-Petrel [LIFER]
  • Pied Cormorant
  • Grey Butcherbird
  • Little Corella


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Eastern Reef Egret

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Sooty Oystercatcher

Now for some fun. I was preparing this webpage on April 24, and was reviewing the photos for March 24 when I came across one image of 4 birds that flew by us as we were walking up to the lighthouse at Byron Bay. I remember spotting the birds as they approached and realized they were different somehow. I only had time for one picture and it turned out to be very blurry and out of focus. Having said that, a noticeable feature was the white area on the upper tail. The overall color of the birds was dark grey or black. Normally the image would be too poor for an attempt at identification but the white tail, combined with the fact that they were likely seabirds, led me to see what might be a candidate. The tail was short and stubby. the wings fairly broad and the size about a foot long. I spent a few hours looking at photos on the web and noticed one of a Black-bellied Storm-Petrel that had been photographed at the Gold Coast which is about 100 km further north along the coast. Another web site said that they were common in this part of the world during November - April. Putting this all together, I feel that adding a Black-bellied Storm-Petrel to our list of Lifers is a fair decision. 


In the evening we watched the fruit bats fly overhead, heading south. A number of these large bats were attacked by Currawongs, which were almost the same size. Fascinating.



March 23, 11:00 am Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

While at Centennial Park we did see some birds:

  • Pacific Black Duck
  • Scaly-breasted Lorikeet (first for 2012)
  • Noisy Miner
  • Dusky Moorhen
  • Forest Kingfisher (first for 2012)
  • Australian Magpie
  • Australian White Ibis
  • Rainbow Lorikeet
  • Magpie-lark
  • Black-faced Cuckoo-shrike (first for 2012)
  • White-headed Pigeon (first for 2012)
  • Australian Raven (first for 2012)
  • Grey Butcherbird


March 22, 11:30 am Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

Here is a list of the birds we saw while walking to the geocache:

  • Spotted Turtle-Dove
  • Little Black Cormorant (first for 2012)
  • Welcome Swallow
  • Pied Cormorant (first for 2012)
  • Magpie-lark (first for 2012)
  • Willie Wagtail (first for 2012)
  • Osprey (first for 2012)
  • Australian White Ibis
  • Masked Lapwing
  • Australian Wood Duck (first for 2012)
  • Brahminy Kite
  • Crested Tern
  • Eastern Rosella (first for 2012)
  • House Sparrow (first for 2012).



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Pied Cormorant


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Welcome Swallow

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Masked Lapwing & Australian Wood Ducks


This brings our totals for this trip to 30 different birds, with 3 of them being lifers. The total number of different birds we have identified on all our Australian visits remains at 198. Our hope is to make it to 200. And it would be nice to log an Emu as a lifer.



March 21, 6:00 PM Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

Here is a list of the birds we saw today:

  • Crested Tern (first for 2012)
  • Galah (first for 2012)
  • Little Corella (first for 2012)
  • Australian White Ibis
  • Cattle Egret
  • Dusky Moorhen (first for 2012)
  • Pacific Black Duck (first for 2012)
  • Comb-crested Jacana (first for 2012)
  • Crested Pigeon (first for 2012)
  • Laughing Kookaburra (first for 2012)
  • Pied Butcherbird (first for 2012)
  • Noisy Miner (first for 2012)
  • Masked Lapwing
  • Welcome Swallow (first for 2012)
  • Glossy Black Cockatoo (LIFER)
  • Australian Magpie
  • Currawong
  • Spotted Turtle-Dove (LIFER)


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Pacific Black Duck


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Noisy Miner


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Laughing Kookaburra


At this point we have identified 22 different birds on this trip, 3 of which are lifers. This brings our total number of distinct Australian birds that we have identified to 198.



March 20, 5:00 PM Birding - Ballina, NSW, Australia

Here is a list birds we saw today:

  • Brahminy Kite (first for 2012)
  • Masked Lapwing (first for 2012)
  • Silver Gull
  • Grey Butcherbird
  • Little Button-quail (LIFER)
  • Cattle Egret (first for 2012)
  • Australian Magpie (first for 2012)
  • Australian White Ibis (first for 2012)
  • Currawong (first for 2012)


All of these birds were seen while driving to Lennox Head or Lismore or while walking in Ballina. We were not doing any serious bird watching. The Little Button-quail sighting took awhile to identify. About 6 - 8 of the little birds scuttled across the path in front of us as we were leaving Seven Mile Beach at Lennox Head.

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March 2, 10:30 am Birding

On the drive home from my geocaching search in Cardston, I spotted an American Bald Eagle resting on a telephone pole. I thought I had seen it (or a friend) on the drive to Cardston but it flew by before I could make a positive identification.

This is the 4th time that I have made an entry for this particular bird. Check the Birds Summary page for an overview table.

© Dale Burnett 2012