Wednesday 25 December 2013

Season's Greetings

A group of King Parrots flew in to greet us at Christmas breakfast and of course they are the perfect colours of Christmas. To make it even more in keeping with the season they tucked into a feast of Mistletoe.

Thursday 12 December 2013

She's blue

Found a visitor on the deck this afternoon not too flighty and stayed for a couple of shots before taking to the wing.
 One of the native carpenter bees, solitary burrowing bees with quite a few species in the family. I am fairly sure this is the female (the male is more green in colour) Metallic Blue Carpenter Bee Xylocopa lestis areatus.

Monday 2 December 2013

Litter in the corner

I was putting some tools away in the shed when I heard a scratching coming from a box in which Christmas decorations were stored and I expected that I was going to find an Antechinus as they are almost impossible to keep out. However after removing all the contents, I found not just one but a mum (Antechinus stuartii stuartii) with her litter of six or seven young. They were not happy and the youngsters clung tightly to their mother as she looked for somewhere to hide. After the photo shoot I found a suitable box for them and moved them to a sheltered area out of the shed which I hope they consider it more suitable and do not find their way back to the shed.


They are cute little creatures but they are a bit of a nuisance since they consider making a nest inside a box or a drawer is much better than in a hollow log or amongst rocks. The female (there are no adult males at this stage as they all die after mating season) brings leaves and grasses into the spot she has chosen for a nest and builds a ball from the materials and when the young are about 5 weeks old she leaves them there whilst she goes hunting for beetles, coackroaches, spiders and other insects.

Sunday 1 December 2013

A little pied

Saw a cormorant fly in and do a couple of circuits of the dam to check if there was any reason not to fly in and then satisfied a quick dive down to have a check for yabbies. Walked down to see if I could get a photo before it got spooked and found it sitting on a branch. Manage to get a few shots but most had vegetation in the way however it moved to another branch and I did manage to get a couple of photos before it took off.


It is a Little Pied Cormorant Phalacrcorax melanoleucos that has a range throughout Australasia and Indonesia and most of the ones I see in our area are around the lake shore or fishing in the lake where they are often in very large numbers.