A day in the West

I had a really crappy night's sleep - woke up after a few hours with my mind finding all sorts of things to keep me awake.  However we did manage to get about a bit.

The first interesting thing was Frances noticed a Crested Pigeon nest right above the tent,
 Unfortunately there was a broken egg on the ground and I think the est was deserted later in the day.  However the birds seemed to be in the mood to start again: definitely seemed to be "tough love" with one bird constantly grabbing the other one's neck.
 Our first call - before breakfast - was to the waste water treatment plant (aka the poo pits).  As well as the water the old dead trees are important as a site for nesting by several species of parrot and cockatoo.
For example, this Cockatiel:

There were a good lot of ducks, with at least 200 each of Grey Teal and Pink-eared Ducks.  This is a small portion of the swimming flock.
Quite a few waders including these Red-necked Avocets ...
.. some sandpipers, Stilts and Red-kneed Dotterels.

We then adjourned to the tent for breakfast.  By the time we got back the 'vanners were leaving.  One couple had interesting contrast in footwearings.
How (and/or why) do you keep boots that shiny when camping out West?

A Yellow-throated Miner perched on the tent.  It left a sample of DNA if any taxonomist wishes to collect same from the fly sheet!
The people from the Illawarra we met at Centenary Lake said that they had had a great visit to Murrin Bridge Reserve.  As we found that dogs were not prohibited (apparently it is a Travelling Stock Reserve not a Nature Reserve) we went in.  There were a few issues>

  1. a lot of burr-clovers which gave Tammy some grief;
  2. some of the tracks were a bit damp, but to quote Jake Blues "Our Lady of Blessed Acceleration" didn't fail us in the soggy bits; and
  3. there was an enormous amount of litter - mainly beer bottles ... 

.... but also several burnt out cars.

A female Red-capped Robin was a nice sighting as was a group (family?) of three Whistling Kites.
The Lachlan River forms the Northern boundary of the Reserve and had a good flow.  Presumably this was from the track soggying rain of Thursday.
On to Chat Alley.  It had some White-fronted Chats but neither of the other two Chat species.  Some White-winged Fairy Wrens were a good sighting as was a small group of Zebra Finches.
We then headed for Sheet of Water but didn't go the most direct route as that was marked 'dry weather only' (see point 2 above).  We actually failed to get there as  the road rain out and th fisherpeople there didn't know the route.  (I have just realised that what we thought was a track into private property was actually the road we should have taken.)  However we did see these Carp placed in a good position
 and a pretty fair sized Goanna
Another side road revealed some Fairy Martins gathering mud for their nests.
After a snooze by me and a stroll along the Lake by Frances we went back to the poo pits to see what they were like later in the day.  Insect enhanced was the answer: aggressive meat-ants underfoot and inquisitive blowies in the air.  Not as relaxed as our walk in the morning.  The Dorpers were moving out on to the mud.
Before calling it a day we returned to the lake to check out a wader Frances had seen.  This turned out to be a Marsh Sandpiper, which are not common.
It has long legs for a sandpiper, but a Pied Stilt shows what really long legs are like!
Back at the tent we were looked at by this pooch.  The fence it is looking over is about 1.5m high.  I suspect it is a Great Dane.



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