This outing is now full. Please note changed meeting place below:
Red Hill NR is an area of Yellow Box-Blakely’s Red Gum Grassy Woodland and is home to Gang-gang Cockatoo, Speckled Warbler, Superb Parrot, Satin Bowerbird and more common resident species and a variety of summer migrants.
Meet at 7.30am at the top of Spence Place Hughes. There is parking along this short place or at the bottom on Jensen Street. Please park only on the left side so we don’t block the street. The walk should take about 3 hours.
Bring hat, water, snack and wear sturdy shoes.
Register with Denise at deniserawling3@gmail.com with name and phone number, and name and number for an emergency contact.
Denise Rawling
On a hazy-bright Australia Day morning, 20 COG members, visitors and neighbours gathered to explore Hughes Grassy Woodland and the western end of Red Hill Nature Reserve, led by Denise Rawling. Despite some initial concern at the number of Noisy Miners about, the outing had a promising start as four Superb Parrots flew overhead. Denise led us through a Sydney Blue Gum (Eucalyptus bicostata) woodland to two recent White-winged Chough nests, on adjacent branches of the same blue-gum. Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos could be heard, most likely feeding in some nearby backyards. Once out of the gums we were delighted by sustained and clear views of more Superb Parrots at the interface of bushland and suburbia, including a juvenile soliciting food from an adult male.
After crossing Kent Street into Red Hill Reserve, the vegetation changed to Yellow Box (Eucalyptus melliodora) and Blakely’s Red Gum (E. blakelyi) grassy woodland. Here we encountered four pairs of Gang-gang Cockatoos, vigorously squabbling over access to what initially appeared to be a nest hollow, but was soon revealed to be a rainwater-fed drinking hollow high in a very old and tortured Blakely’s gum. Once satiated, one of the males began investigating other hollows, including backing completely into one, perhaps as reference for a future breeding season. We were blessed by the calls of Gang-gangs throughout the rest of the walk, as well as by a sighting of an uncoloured juvenile accompanied by an adult male and female.
We also enjoyed numerous prolonged and vivid views of Australian King Parrots, including the sight of one female hanging upside down just a metre above the ground in a Kangaroo Apple (Solanum linearifolium) as she appeared to eat the green, unripe fruit. At one point on our return, we witnessed Superb Parrots, King Parrots, a Grey Butcherbird and a Pied Currawong all in the same Ash (Fraxinus sp.) bush at the same time. Two Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoos finally revealed themselves by flying overhead. And a close and confiding Laughing Kookaburra prompted a very useful discussion on the different appearance of adult males, adult females, and juveniles.
Small woodland birds were distressingly absent from most of the walk, as expected by the prevalence of Noisy Miners. No wrens, scrub-wrens, pardalotes, fantails or Willie Wagtails were encountered and, of the thornbills, only Striated, and Buff-rumped Thornbills, and Weebills were heard, in just one location. We noticed that the woodland trees sported very few mistletoes, possibly as a result of the missing small birds.
Over the two sites we saw a total of 23 species of birds, with almost half of these (10 species) being parrots and cockatoos (Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoo, Gang-gang Cockatoo, Galah, Little Corella, Sulphur-rested Cockatoo, Superb Parrot, Australian King Parrot, Crimson Rosella, Eastern Rosella and Rainbow Lorikeet), a fitting ratio for the national day of the ‘Land of Parrots’.
Thanks to Denise for leading and for so generously sharing her local knowledge of this fascinating habitat, and to Lia Battisson for keeping the bird list of the walk.
Mitchell Kelly
