ANPS Phinds Phlowers with Phog at Aranda

Reader advisory: this post contains images of a former kangaroo.  If the sight of dead things concerns you, hit page down a couple of times.

It was a rather foggy start to the outing today.

While the tribe was gathering I was wandering about the parking lot when a member (who is now excused a whole lot of future naughtiness) called to me to come to her car.  This gave me, and subsequently others breathtaking views of a young Wedge-tailed Eagle  doing its bit for Clean-up Australia.

Eventually it took off.  This is a naff photo, but it does show the pattern of golden mantle and black primaries.

 It perched in a tree about 50m away so this shot is a tad pixcellated but really gives a good idea of the shape and strength of the bill.

To balance that, here is a very Monetish impression of the talons.  I really wouldn't want them to be stuck in to any part of me.

My friend Lindell visited the site a couple of days later and found that much of the carcass had gone, but the only carnivorous birds were a pair of Corvus canoodlous (the Amorous Raven).  Here is her image of them.

The first flowers (phirst phlowers?) were Acacia genistifolia.

Somewhat later we found the other early Acacia, A gunnii: note the ploughshare shaped phyllodes.

 Cryptandra amara was in bud.

 I think this is Monotoca scoparia: a Winter-flowering specialist (my note-taking got a bit embarrassed here).

 Chrysocephalum apiculatum.

Near a dam 4 Purple Swamphens were grazing (as they were 2 weeks ago when COG visited the area).

 Then we found some of the Snow Gums (in our money, Eucalyptus pauciflora) were in flower.

Further upslope the Eucalyptus rubida (Candlebark) was also in procreational mode.  Note the clusters of 3 buds in the background.

 A fair sized flock (my guess is close to 100 in total) of Sulphur-crested Cockatoos were dining  ...

 ... on roots they dug up.

 This left a rather well tilled patch of dirt.

 Hibbertia riparia as present initially as a single flower ..

 .. and later as a very floriferous bush.

 Moving up the hill we entered the Vale of Darkness (aka the area cleansed by a more or less controlled burn).  Many of the trees - I think this one was Eucalyptus dives - were showing epicormic growth.

 Now we get to the foggy stuff.  This yellow bean was a strange colour form of Daviesia mimosoides.

 This is the normal 'egg and bacon' form of D mimosoides.

Glycine clandestina

This is a mysterious member of the Asteraceae (Olearia sp.).  Herbaria folk are to be consulted as to the specific identity of the plant.  There were quite a lot of them growing over an area of about 10m x 3m.  Following said consultations it has been determined to be Olearia tenuifolia.

 Some fungi.  As usual, species identity may be added later if I can work it out.

 This was fungus growing on fungus!

A more observant member of the group noted that these fruiting bodies had changed dramatically between us first passing them and our return about 2 hours laterr.

 

One of our targets was a colony of Hakea decurrens.  The red stems are a diagnostic feature.

 The seed capsules are also usually helpful, biut these were smaller than usual and less 'bumpy'.

Pultenaea procumbens.

 This is simply an interesting twining vine (Cassytha sp).

 If my note-taking was back on track this is Leucopogon attenuatus. Probably a bit earlier than expected.

 Vittadinia cuneata

 Brachyscome rigidula.

 At the finish the fog had lifted and we could easily see the Arboretum with the sculpture dnaL nworB ediW clearly visible.

Thanks to the wonders of horizontal image rotation it can be re-manifested as the better-known "Wide Brown Land" without putting in a few kms of driving!