Nature in Carwoola: less bad and less-less bad

Years ago we followed the detective stories written by Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo in which the realists in the Stockholm Police never rated anything as good.  Their ultimate accolade was "less bad".  We will get to the duplicatory situation at the end of the post but be warned, like most detective stories death is involved in this post, so if you are sensitive don't go past the beetle image..

With the day being hot I decided about noon to take the small beast for a Thelymitra hunt in a known area on Whiskers Creek Rd.  We got lucky and found about 10 flowering plants of T. pauciflora.

This inspired me to go and check a few known haunts of the species on our property and sure enough there they were.  Only three plants found but that is better than the big fat zero I had previously got for this year.

The patch of Diuris pardina near our most productive orchid patch was a bit thinner than in recent years but they are coming up now.
 D. sulphurea are really hitting their straps all over the property.

I lifted a rain-water butt this morning and there was a nice little frog - I suspect from the shape of the ridges -  Crinia signifera resting under it.
While taking the small dog for her major walk earlier this morning we saw two Red-necked Wallabies, which are quite unusual on the property.  This image doesn't show the redness too well but the overall shape of the animal, and the way it moved, were quite different from the Eastern Grey Kangaroos.  The gait was much more like the hunched over 'bounding' of a Swampie.
 On looking under a rock I found this small beetle sheltering from the heat.  Naming will occur later.
As we came back past the house I noticed a small grey lump on the ground.  Giving it a little attention it was obviously a Tawny Frogmouth chick. 'Was' is definitely the correct tense: ants were already doing what ants do.
 On reading HANZAB I found that it is quite common for chicks to fall out of the nest and I suspect that is what has happened here with the poor thing flapping a few metres to where I found it.  Clearly the event happened overnight so predation by an owl was a possibility but the usual suspects for predating Frogmouth nests are apparently Ravens and Currawongs, neither of which are nocturnal..

Checking the nest there is still at least one chick in there.

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