ANPS does 6 Mile TSR and Wanna Wanna NR

The original plan for today was to go to Bald Hill Fire Trail but due to scoring 23mm of rain on 8 November, with more promised for today we decided to go for Plan B visiting a couple of areas closer to Canberra so that:
  • we didn't have to battle tall wet foliage; and
  • we could easily beat a retreat if needed.
The first site was the 6 Mile TSR which I had visited a few days earlier (some of the photographs in that post may be of interest to readers of this one) and the second the Wanna Wanna Nature Reserve WWNR) closer to Queanbeyan.  (I will note up front that the linked Plan for WWNR shows it to be 33Ha in area: much larger than I had thought.)

The images that follow are pretty much in the order I took them rather than attempting any thematic enhancement.  That means the shots from 6 Mile are first.

A close up of a bee in a Podalepis.  I regard an insect photo in which I can see the proboscis as beeing (sic) in focus.
 Austrodanthonia sp: I don't usually photograph grass, but do like the shape of this one.  (I don't like folk who muck around with names so am leaving it as Austrodanthonia!)
 Pultenaea subspicata
Leucochrysum albicans albicans var tricolor: an officially endangered variety which seems to decorate every roadside in the area.  This shot makes it clear why it has the appellation 'tricolor'!  Being consistent about my dislike of name changers I am sticking to the 4 barrel name until someone gives me a convincing argument as to (1) why it was 4 levels originally and more importantly (2) why one of the 'albicans' is now seen as redundant!
 Underside and backside of a brilliant blue moth.  I have seen these before, but never realised that the underparts were also a brilliant blue colour.  Referring back to a much earlier post I suspect that this was Pollanisus apicalis
 A Black-faced Cuckoo-shrike (which is of course neither a Cuckoo nor a Shrike)!  But it is still a very attractive bird: I'd suggest this is a young bird due to the limited black area but not a White-bellied Cuckoo-shrike as the black goes well past the eye.
 This blog is not limited by time or space.  This is clearly the type specimen of Yoda stellarius.
 Dicranolius villosus on a Leucochrysum.
 We now shift to WWNR.  Here we found a couple of examples of a yellow form of Pultanaea procumbens, mixed in with the traditional flowers with some red in them.
 Gompholobium huegelii:  this initial plant had a single but particularly large flower ....
 ... but this later example wins a prize for spectacularity!
 A beetle - Ecnolagria ?grandis.
This is an arboreal cockroach: possibly an early instar of Ellipsidion australe the Beautiful Cockroach!
Just as the storms began to appear we found what appeared to be an old mullock heap. I don't know what the miners were looking for but the colour of the rejected rocks suggests there was plenty of mineralisation.

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