COG emulates Paddy Pallin

Among many good statements by the famous Australian bush walker (and purveyor of kit for same) Paddy Pallin was the title of his autobiography "Never Really Lost".

Seen on a screen-map the area looks as though it would be hard to get lost in with the Creek as a dominant feature and being surrounded by water.

One confounding factor is that some maps show Dalley Crescent as going from Florey Drive to Southern Cross Drive.  In fact the bit around the Creek, hatched in red, doesn't exist.

Some further geographic confusion might get mentioned below.

About 30 members gathered on the Western bit of Dalley Cr, Latham for a "figure of eight" tour of this reserve.  The initial stages of the walk were pretty quiet and we took an off track excursion to look, unsuccessfully for indigenous axe- grinding grooves in some rocks by the Creek.

A family of Willie Wagtails ...

and a small flock of Red-browed finches

being highlights as we crossed Ginninderra Creek for the first time.

After using the stepping stones to get back across the creek we got into bushier country 

...  with a much more diverse avifauna.  As well as quite a few of the usual bush birds along this stretch those at the back of the group scored a Collared Sparrowhawk while (some of) the front runners saw a female White-winged Triller.  Neither were captured as digits

Although there still seemed to be water in the creek waterbirds per se were very few.  Two Great Cormorants and 2 Straw-necked Ibis flew over and 2 Australian White Ibis landed briefly.  In the stretch to the west of Florey Drive the highlight was the relatively large number of Sacred Kingfishers observed .  At one point 4 of this species were visible at one time (and 7 were recorded for the whole walk).  This was a distant view ...

 .. while a much closer shot was possible soo after cutting back under Florey Drive.

Returning to the cars a low point was a flock of 11 Common Mynahs - many of the group noted this to be a very large group in recent times.  

This was balanced by the pleasing sighting of 3 Double-barred Finches.  They didn't hang around for photography.

This playground feature ...

...  attracted some interest and it was thought a similar feature would make a nice lookout tower for Fyshwick Sewage Ponds.  Perhaps COG could raise this with Icon Water?  I became a little worried when we passed it a second time: were we going to fail to do as well as Paddy?  No, the problem was the long grass which obscured the view of the track from the far side of the Creek.

Some quality graffiti 

.  had attracted some feral pigeons to nest under Florey Drive.  Our only breeding record of the day,

Overall members of the group recorded 44 species.  A full list is at https://ebird.org/view/checklist/S52946964