Saturday 21 December 2013

The Birds of Adelaide

As always I was keen to see some birds on my recent trip to Adelaide. Some were easy to find, others remained elusive.

Swans (Cygnus atratus) were easy,
they're everywhere down near the river. 

Dusky Moorhens (Gallinula tenebrosa) were easy too.
They had their chicks with them this day. 

There was a bit of aggro between the swans and the moorhens.
I wasn't quite sure why. 

It took me a while to realise that these two were something different.
A new species for me!

Black-tailed Native-hens.
(Tribonyx ventralis)

Australasian Darter
(Anhinga novaehollandiae)

Little Black Cormorant
(Phalacrocorax sulcirostris)
I was very keen to find a musk lorikeet as it would have been another new species for me. While I found a lot of lorikeets, they were all rainbow lorikeets. Funny thing is a few days after I got home I saw musk lorikeets here- when I never had before!

Rainbow Lorikeet
(Trichoglossus haematodus)
Similarly, I was keen to find Adelaide Rosellas. And of course I only found the already familiar Eastern Rosellas.

Eastern Rosellas
(Platycercus eximius)

There were lots of ducklings everywhere

Hardhead duck
(Aythya australis)

Saturday Snapshot is a wonderful weekly meme now hosted by WestMetroMommy

11 comments:

  1. Plenty of those coloured parrots in our garden at the moment wiping out the fruit trees!

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  2. The birds are so beautiful, especially the black swans. Have a great day, Louise!

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  3. I always love looking at your birding photos. I was thinking to myself, "are all their birds dark?" and then your next pic was of a rainbow lorikeet and a then a eastern rosella. Nope, colorful one abound in Australia too! Thanks for putting a bright spot in my rather drab and wintry day.

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  4. You have birds, and I have birds, but how different the environs! Take a look at my Sat. Snapshot and you'll see. ;) And so beautiful the colors of yours.

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  5. Greta pics - birds are so fascinating!

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  6. That black swan is just lovely! And the rainbow lorikeet is just so vivid! Beautiful captures, this week! Merry Christmas!

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  7. Love learning some Australian bird identities. We have rainbow lorikeets at the zoo here, but nothing with so many colors in the wild.

    That first photo of the swan is stunning -- you captured the perfect pose and the colors & composition are wonderful.

    Joy's Book Blog

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  8. Beautiful birds, especially the lorikeet.

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  9. We live in one of the best spots in the US for birders (or so they tell me) but I never see birds like this.

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  10. The Rainbow Lorikeets are show stoppers! It seems entirely alien that you could have such colourful birds just casually sitting in your gardens. The birds here in the UK generally blend into the dusky landscape. I've just put out their Christmas fat balls :-D

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