You want Whistling Ducks?

Hasties Swamp has got them.'

Before getting to them I will deal with a matter outstanding from Saturday. where I think I mentioned that Tammy had to go back to the vet today.  We were not that optimistic about the outcome as most of the easy options had been ruled out.  However it turns out her problem was a couple of rotten molars which the vet has removed and he reckons she should be OK.  She's currently a bit dopey but we are expecting dancing dog back in a short while.

So after dropping Tammy off at the vet's (the excellent Ready Vet practise) we headed out to Hastie's Swamp on the outskirts of Atherton.  As we pulled up we could hear a lot of bird calls.

 I have no real idea how many Plumed Whistling Ducks there were there, but have put a guess of 5,000 into eBird.  (I have since rationalised this by calculating the flock covering 500m, and being 10 birds deep @ 1m per duck.) I also had no idea of the Magpie geese,  There were less of them - say 2,000.

 Here is an overview of both species.

 More Magpie Geese flew in....

 .. as did Plumed Whistling Ducks.

 Here is a close up of a Plumed Whistling Duck: note the light brown head and particularly the pink legs.  The bills are also allegedly pink, but many of them seemed to be patchy.  We couldn't spot a Wandering Whistling Duck amongst the horde.

 For fairness here are a couple of Magpie Geese.

We eventually left to do a leg along Danbulla Rd on the Northern side of Lake Tinnaroo.  We went the longer way round to check out the Tolga Woodworks (excellent - certainly comparable with the Bungendore Woodworks.  On the way I noticed this place - a nice play on the institution at Longreach, to be looked at in a few weeks.

 Here is one part of the Lake, with the hills in the background.  Near here we spotted a Victoria's Riflebird a lifer and (I think my first Bird of Paradise).

Frances spotted this facility in one of the campsites - note the hook to haul up the shower.

 That campground also featured some planted Callistemons which were proving very attractive to honeyeaters and lorikeets.  In one case the ground under the bush was covered in flower parts.

Some fungus on the Lake Eumaloo walk

 Here is Lake Eumaloo.  Geologically this is a maar - a crater within a crater.

While we were looking at this, 2 male Ulysses butterflies (Papilio ulysses) fluttered by.  I am not sure if we have ever seen them before but they were absolutely magnificent.  They kept on flying so no photo (yet).

Our final stroll was the Mobo Creek Crater walk. It turns out it isn't a crater at all but merely where the creek has swung around a basalt outcrop.  This image shows the creek, with some tall tree ferns catching the sun in the distance.

As we got back to the car a Grey-headed Robin flew across the road: another lifer.

An attraction of the area is the Cathedral Fig.  This really is a huge tree and the roots do look a bit like the buttresses of cathedrals.

Back home the first Bar-shouldered Dove of the trip turned up to check us out.

 We have started to sort out the garden birds, many of which seem to find good food in the Coral Tree (Erythina sp.).

 This white Bauhinia sp. just looks nice.

• Bird of the Day: The flock category was an easy win for Plumed Whistling Duck.  In the individual awards, I gave the medal to Victoria's Riflebird, an endemic to the area.  Olive-backed Sunbird and Spectacled Monarch was a strong contender.
• Vegetation of the day:  Cathedral Fig!
• Memorable moment: Ulysses butterflies.  (It was memorable, but with a 14 hour lag as I didn't recall it until the next morning!).
• Comment of the day:  I asked a guy wearing a black shirt with a yellow and red logo where in Super Cheap Auto I could find an extension cord.  His response was "I don't work here", and indeed on looking closer the logo was indeed quite different!
• Pie of the day: None eaten
• Troppo moment of the day.  The shower cubicle!

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