Sights of the Bunker area

This morning(20 June)  I went out to the Bunker Museum for a bit of maintenance.  There were a few birds around so I had eBird running and it gave this track.  It is purely crazy to log that as traveling (1.28 km) so I used Google Earth to estimate the area as 0.68 Ha.

A bunch of leaves and twigs had been raked up and ignited.  Should be safe with about 10 SES folk around, honing their chainsaw skills.

When people have been exploring the bush after the fire they have found relics such as these components of the power supply to the accommodation area.  That is about 300 m from the bunker location.   Note the different styles of insulator - no idea why they are different.

In other cases a lower-tech approach was used to mounting the insulators.  It is interesting to contemplate these having been bolted into the tree for around 75 years!

Some modest size Allocasuarina littoralis were growing under the canopy.

This cone is begging a Glossy Black-cockatoo to come and munch it!

I was in the general are the next day and when over by the Gun Club saw a small bird hoping around in the base of some shrubs.  To my astonishment it turned out to be a Red-capped Robin: usually a bird of the dry inland.  Sorry about the quality of photo but the windscreen was dusty!

From the tinge of red on the breast I think this is an immature male bird,

That was so unusual we went back on the 22nd to walk the area and see if we could relocate it. We didn't despite "walking the walk".

However we got a tad excited when we found some Jacky Winters on the fence as we started off.

There was also a more exciting Tawny-crowned Honeyeater but it didn't pose.   This area is a known hotspot for that species but they have been absent since the fires.  That was unfortunately just about the end of the birds.  I totalled 5 species with the other excitement being hearing a pair of White-bellied Sea-Eagles quacking away, and eventually seeing one bird fly off towards the Betka River.

It would be an exaggeration to describe the area as carpeted with flowers but there were some.  A nice development given the area was mulched last year and then burnt!  This is Acacia suavolens.

The three colour forms of Epacris impressa were all present.

A few specimens of Euphrasia collina were seen.

I can't attach a name to the daisy, but liked the visiting, and cooperative Hoverfly.

Pimelia humilis

As we walked along the edge of the forest I was again surprised to see epicormic growth on the Allocasuarina littoralis.  As these trees are mature they will hopefiully develop some cones later in the year.

A little further along the woodland edge we found some trees of this species, about 3m high, which seemed to have escaped the fire completely.  Presumably the fire was fairly low intensity after crossing the mulched heath.