Bird watching Expedition on Mt Painter

At the crack of dawn on a recent Sunday morning, Ella and I fronted up to a bird watching session hosted by the Friends of Mt Painter. Despite being a beautiful morning, perfect for spotting birds, it was not surprisingly only a small group consisting mainly of older folk turned out.

Ella was kitted out with her binoculars and bird identification book, the latter not needed as our guide, Nikki was a walking encyclopedia! Our bird spotting list included house sparrow, crested pigeon, the endangered superb parrot, red wattlebird, black faced cuckoo shrike, magpie, common myna, superb fairy wren, yellow rumped thornbill, crimson rosella, sulphur crested cockatoo, king parrot, eastern rosella, willy wagtail, fantail, galah, weebill and nankeen kestrel.

We learnt lots with many questions asked and answered. The most interesting bit of information, according to Ella, was about the superb fairy wren's nest - constructed in thickets about a metre off the ground, the entrance to the nest is located on the side, while on top an empty decoy nest sits. We heard about the parasitic mistletoe seen on numerous eucalypts in the area.

Our bird watching journey took about an hour only covering about 2km in distance. Nikki gave Ella an ACT Bird identification book, another bird book for her collection! The bird watching session finished just in time to drop Andy off at the airport (he was going to Lorne for most of the week).

Thanks to Grandpa for the tip off about the session...we will definitely be back :) Ella really enjoyed herself as did I. This is what the rest of Sunday looked like - Ella busy researching and drawing!