Andrew and Trish Forsyth Werribee Tour 17 February, 2009

The Challenge: convince two birders who live at Daintree, the heart of the fabulous Wet Tropics of Far North Queensland, the most bird-rich part of the country, that it is still possible to see masses of birds in lil’ ol’ Melbourne.

The solution: a trip to the Western Treatment Plant (Werribee Sewage Farm). Luckily after some absolutely horrendous hot weather in the previous weeks, conditions were pretty conducive for some good birding. As we approached the farm along 29 Mile and Beach Roads, the signs were promising with good numbers of Musk and Purple-crowned Lorikeets and honeyeaters taking advantage of the flowering roadside Sugar Gums and a male Black Falcon which showed magnificently in front of us. Out in the dry paddocks, a pair of Banded Lapwing stood cautiously by two half grown young- a good sign as this grassland dependant species is quickly being squeezed out of the Melbourne area. Another local specialty, and usually furtive species, the Striated Field-wren popped up a couple of times on fences to give us superb views.

And this was all before we had even glimpsed any water of any kind. Despite conditions being not nearly so good as they had earlier in the summer (the water levels were just not quite right- too deep in the wader roosts near Lake Borrie South, too dry on the conservation ponds after several days of forty-three plus degrees. But even in less than optimal conditions, Werribee can still produce the goods. There were Cape Barren Geese at both the T Section Lagoons and Paradise Road- always good to see these birds up close. From a distance they may look a bit dull, a bit like a feathered sheep, but at close quarters when you can see the pale caps, salmon legs and green cere well, they really are amazing looking creatures. Roosting on rocks off Kirk Point was a mixed flock of terns included 65 Common and one Fairy Tern. While at Kirk Point, Andrew spied four Brown Quail that sat frozen by the car and then later at Little River he picked out another racing across the road in front of the car. Not having personally seen this species before at Werribee, I couldn’t help but think that perhaps Andrew had smuggled a few quail down from Queensland and was surreptitiously releasing them out when we weren’t looking.

While waders weren’t as thick on the ground as usual, we still managed up close views of Red-necked Stints, Sharpies and Curlew Sandpipers as well as Red-kneed Dotterels, Red-capped Plover and some early arriving Double-banded Plovers. In one of those fortuitous moments that make you look a better birder than you really are, I was able to conjure up our first Black-fronted Plover of the day just by saying that the lagoon we were approaching looked good for them. If only that strategy had worked for the Long-toed Stint and Pectoral Sandpiper which failed to put in an appearance. A Spotted Crake was spotted darting along the mud banks of Little River, while out at sea a loose flotilla of 21 Great Crested Grebe bobbed about. A hugely impressive immature White-breasted Sea-Eagle cruised imperiously around Lake Borrie, yet hardly disturbed the flock of 21 White-winged Black Tern that were roosting there.

Waterfowl numbers were impressive as usual, though down on what you would expect at this time of the year and we had to search long and hard to find any Blue-billed Ducks or Hardheads at all. Embarrassed that I couldn’t show them the Blue-billeds, a bird I had almost assigned “dead cert” status to, we had to look almost the entire length of the farm before hooking up with any.

Sadly the Hudsonian Godwit along with any other godwits was not to be found, and we missed out on the Yellow Wagtail that was found only a couple of days later. Perhaps if I had declared what I was thinking at the time, “This is where we had the Yellow Wag about ten years ago- it’s about time we got another,” right at the spot it would soon be found, it might have appeared like Black-fronted Plovers did. Perhaps I had subconsciously seen it out of the corner of my eye and should claim the Yellow Wagtail retrospectively, but no birdwatching court in the land would believe me! But with a species tally of 85 in just under five hours, Trish and Andrew seemed more than happy, and now they know that you don’t have to be in north Queensland to be surrounded by heaps of birds!

Birds Seen.

Blue-billed Duck	Australian Spotted Crake	Superb Fairy-wren
Cape Barren Goose	Purple Swamphen	Striated Fieldwren
Musk Duck	Eurasian Coot	White-browed Scrubwren
Black Swan	Common Greenshank	Brown Thornbill
Australian Shelduck	Red-necked Stint	Yellow-rumped Thornbill
Pacific Black Duck	Sharp-tailed Sandpiper	Red Wattlebird
Australasian Shoveler	Curlew Sandpiper	White-plumed Honeyeater
Grey Teal	Black-winged Stilt	New Holland Honeyeater
Chestnut Teal	Red-capped Plover	White-fronted Chat
Pink-eared Duck	Black-fronted Plover	Magpie-lark
Hardhead	Red-kneed Dotterel	Willie Wagtail
Australian Wood Duck	Double-banded Plover	Dusky Woodswallow
Hoary-headed Grebe	Banded Lapwing	Australian Magpie
Great-crested Grebe	Masked Lapwing	Little Raven
Little Pied Cormorant	Pacific Gull	Skylark
Pied Cormorant	Silver Gull	House Sparrow
Little Black Cormorant	Crested Tern	European Greenfinch
Australian Pelican	White-winged Black Tern	European Goldfinch
White-faced Heron	Common Tern	Zebra Finch
Australian White Ibis	Fairy Tern	Welcome Swallow
Straw-necked Ibis	Crested Pigeon	Fairy Martin
Glossy Ibis	Galah	Clamorous Reed-Warbler
Royal Spoonbill	Sulphur-crested Cockatoo	Little Grassbird
Yellow-billed Spoonbill	Musk Lorikeet	Golden-headed Cisticola
Black-shouldered Kite	Purple-crowned Lorikeet	Australasian Pipit
Whistling Kite	Red-rumped Parrot	Silvereye
Swamp Harrier	Horsfield's Bronze-cuckoo	Common Starling
White-breasted Sea-Eagle		Common Mynah
Brown Falcon
Black Falcon