Sorry for the lag in posts, the first of the year bird count reset means we are in a target rich environment, especially down here in south Texas. Sun up to sun down we are chasing birds and then by the time I get the spoils offloaded to the storage drives (and the secondary storage drives), make the eBird submissions, update Intrigued’s Average Year bird tracker and write up the day’s trip report I am absolutely exhausted. My brother Ron was also able to join us for a few days so I’m trying my best to get him caught up – yes, our brotherly “competition” transitions to “collaboration” when we are in the field together. My slow start is picking up steam as I’m now on firm ground in the Texas top 100 birders list and steadily climbing. Even bagged a premier rarity for the Rio Grande Valley today – a nice gift for my birthday (today). More to come on that success, but for now, if you are interested you can get up to speed on where we’ve been on our Average Year status page (note, I have not been able to get the charts updated yet) – link here. Best of all, I’ve been meeting a number of wonderful and extremely helpful birders this trip – our feather community never ceases to amaze me.
While I recover from my birthday celebration, going to put you in Brad’s capable hands to bring you another very special bird from their trip “Down Under”. Take care everybody, I’ll be back once things start settling down here.
Take it away Brad…
The title of this story should get your braincells remembering a song from childhood. That is, if you are over a certain age. I’m not admitting to anything at all, mind you.
Jan and I were on assignment down under. We had just completed a long day visiting Taronga Zoo in Sydney and traversing everything there is to see at Sydney Harbour. We spent a little while trying to find P. Sherman at 42 Wallaby Way (from Finding Nemo by Disney), but then decided it was probably time to find our hotel.
Sydney is a lovely city to visit. There’s a bit of nearly everything for any visitor. Sydney has tall buildings for the architecture lover. There are great restaurants liberally sprinkled through the downtown area. A few blocks away from the harbour is fantastic shopping, even some very high-end stores with queues forming outside an hour before the stores opened. Not to mention the Sydney Opera House (a life goal) and the Sydney Harbour Bridge, both right on the water. In my humble opinion, Intrigued readers really must visit Sydney. No, I’m not being compensated by their tourism council. And yes, I’m using Australian spellings where they differ with their American cousins for this story.
On the way back from the harbour area, Jan and I decided to walk through the Royal Botanic Garden Sydney. It was on the way to our hotel after all, and a great chance to look for birds. Within seconds of setting foot in the botanical garden, our first photo subject was prepped and ready to go for us. I was looking to the right side of the path at a Noisy Miner and Jan was looking to the left. She lifted her arm to point at a bird in the tree and asked, “What’s that?” Before I could turn to focus my attention, she had raised her camera and was firing away.
Not going to see one of these hanging out in one of our local trees, that’s for sure. Hit the jump to learn more about this kooky looking bird!
Continue reading Old Gum Tree…by Brad Marks
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