PIed Cormorant – Birds as Poetry —— Just because I WANDER

We had truth be told, taken a trip down to the Jawbone Conservation Park at Williamstown. One of my Flickr mates David Nice, had reported a Great Crested Grebe. As the ponds can give good access to the birds in quite a few places, it seemed like a good idea to have a looksee.

On our day, however, the Great Crested Grebes (there are two there), must have been hunting out in the open water, as not a crest nor a feather were to be found.

As the Jawbone lakes are quiet water, the water birds use the area as a resting spot, and also to get to know one another it seems.

We watched for 15 to 20 minutes a pair of Pied Cormorant that had more than fishing on their mind.

Continue reading “Pied Cormorant Call of the Season” →

Was chatting with a birder friend, and I mentioned the Point Cook Coastal Park, and he said, that he didn’t plan to go there much as most of the birds were pretty common, and only occasionally was a Plover or a Pratincole enough to take the trip down there.

When we relocated home a couple of years back, Point Cook was on the top of my list as a suitable place, and to be honest, it was second, third and a close run fourth on the list. And of course the logic was it was but a few minutes from the Coastal Park of the same name, and it would be neat to roll out of bed, and stroll on down to the park.

In the end, much wiser heads than mine (EE as it turns out) found us the place that ‘we’ wanted and Tarneit took on our new home address.
But every so often when the light is right, and sometimes when its wrong we venture down to the Coastal Park. And surprisingly, many of the common birds down there have become a bit like friends.
So today we went, not to count, nor to get our lists up, nor necessarily to capture the best bird photos ever, but to visit some friends.

Our friend the Brown Falcon was in the carpark area, and we enjoyed some time with it, as it hunted quite casually from the fence line. Also found a number of Flame Robins that have made the park their winter beach residence.

And of course the usual Pied, Little Pied and Great Cormorants down on the old jetty. They gave us some pretty impressive flight displays while we sipped on a fine cuppa.

Then the local White-faced Heron, and the pair of Pacific Gulls cruised by hunting on the out-going tide. And to our amusement, a pair of Black Swans how have obviously just coupled up were making interesting subjects as they hunted together on the gentle rolling outgoing tide.

As we walked back to carpark, the air literally filled with raptors.

At one point we had all up at the same time, Little Eagle, Black Kite, Whistling Kite, Brown Falcon, Australian Hobby and Brown Goshawk. I was hoping that the resident Spotted Harrier would make an appearance, but we had to be satisfied with those six.

We stopped along the road to look at some Flame Robins bathing in a tiny pool in a paddock, and some ‘new friends’, came over to say ‘hello’. So we spent a few minutes becoming acquainted with several chesnut horses.

We might not have added any ‘new’ birds to our list, but we had as the Sans Bushman said, “Recognised some birds,and built a tiny connection with them, that is growing into a thread”

Enjoy.