Bits and bobs

This covers a few things seen in the last couple of days that haven't quite justified a post in their own right.

The tale begins on Saturday 25th with attending Bastion Point where Frances attended a ukulele class on the beach.  As we arrived a skein of Pelicans appeared and I was able to get a few in shot before they disappeared behind vegetation.  I like the way the leader has an upturned primary: very like the winglets on large modern jets.

The sea itself was very calm.  I could almost have been persuaded to insert the kayak into it.   Note the weasel word "almost"!

It wasn't dead calm.  Moving along to the steps I was heard to request that the sand road be constructed again!

Getting through that took a little time so I didn't go all the way to the Opening.  There were quite a few birds around when peered at through my telescope.  The highlight was finding a total of 6 White-fronted Chats.  There 3 of each sex, but none of the females paused: they all bolted into clumps of reeds where I susect they might have been nesting.  Two of the males were astonishingly obliging.

Later in the day Karbeethong decided to emulate Brigadoon.

A flock of Satin Bowerbirds have been appearing withe fair regularity this year.  At one point in the arvo of the 25th there were 8 green birds probing the lawn.  The blue male doesn't turn up often.  Sorry about the quality of the photo but it was taken through a double glazed window and a pane of glass on our verandah!

Several Crimson Rosellas were also grazing on the lawn.  While these are common birds in most of SE Australia when I look at all closely at them I recall taking an English colleague for a run in Canberra.  When a Crimson landed in a bush a few feet away he stopped dead in his tracks.  Such lurid birds are not part of the UK avifauna.

On the 26th I rode down to the wharf to check the gauge.  Before doing so, a guy working nearby spotted my binoculars and thought I might know what species had laid this egg.  

I have subsequently established that it was a Pelican.  Apparently a nearby island rookery was flooded and several eggs washed ashore.  (A resident who found another egg wished she found it sooner as she has an incubator and could have tried hatching the  chick so she could  " have a Mr Percival. That would be very cool walking down the street with ya pelicans."  Way cool indeed!

The bottom of the gauge is a bit clagged but scaling from the image I estimate the level (at mid-tide) is about 0.1 metres.  So a drop of 1.5m from the high point.

A large (perhaps 0.5m)octopus had been caught out by the flush.

Moving on to the 27th and another East Coast Low has formed.  Thus far (1100 hrs) it has dropped nearly 40 mm on Mallacoota but 176 mm on Moruya!  Mallacoota is right on the edge of the range of the radar from Captains Flat as presented by BoM.

The interpretation of the radar data by weatherzone is much more like what we are experiencing.

Interestingly the radar image from the BoM phone app is much more reasonable.

The Betka River which had closed again had reopened naturally.  

A large plume of sediment was running from Mullet Creek out into the Inlet.

By 1700 hrs we were up to 65.6 mm for the day and 73.6 mm for the event.