Doings on 6 August

This post will cover a wide range of things seen and done on 6 August 2023.  The day started with a visit to the Wharf  to see the pigeons being released.  On arrival yet another family of Masked Lapwings were present.  By Lapwing standards they were quite laid back.

Here are the trucks carrying the pigeons - 3275 birds.

The cloud was beginning to break up.

Some closer views of the truck and the pigeons.

I am far from clear on the procedures involved in this event.  I think this bloke was releasing some catches on each box.

Then shutters were dropped.

The next several images are of the flock heading off.

The birds didn't seem to do as much circling as I have often seen.  Basically across the wharf and off to the North.

The results are listed in velocity order but I can't work out how that is calculated.  The first bird seems to have got back to its loft taking 4:00:46 to cover 399kms: thus an average of just under 100kph.  The winner covered 422.627 kms in 4:07:49, averaging 102.324kph.

My next job was helping the Friends with cleaning up Genoa Rd.  This was a cleverly thought out operation with a random draw for stretches of road.  People operated in pairs and was with Bob Fisher on the 7th section,  Markers had been put out  and each stretch was about 1.5kms with one of each pair starting at the ends and walking towards each other, transferring car keys in the middle.  It was important to walk facing the traffic: our stretch was narrow with more than a few blind bends.

The most exciting bit for me was crossing Double Creek, with a large school of fish visible.  Some were Luderick while others were Mullet.

iNaturalist has been consulted about this one!

The end is nigh! Bob's car is in the distance, although the one visible is the organisers with trailer.

Bob found he had hit the jackpot: he'd filled both his bags but still many Carlton Draft stubbies at the foot of the bank.  We went back to get the rest.

In addition to those Bob had fitted in the bags he schlepped we filled three shopping bags with bottles.  The more I think about this the more puzzled I am: if they had been two slabs of empties that fell off a ute we should have found the carton.

Next job was removing some dead growth from a Leptospermum in the front lawn.  Chainsaws are Good!  I got a barrow full of firewood (for next year) out of this.

I'm in there somewhere!

Then we went for a walk to the marsh from Fisheries Jetty.  These Caspian Terns were bird of the day.

On thinking about it, I suspect the fish is a small Flathead.

If Grebes pose they get photographed.

Early Onset Cabin Fever

The weather so far this month is rather odd.  I posted the following to Facebook on 18 July.

By 18 July my weather station had recorded a whole 3.8mm of rain. (BoM at the airport has only managed 2.8 mm.) The lowest amount previously recorded since my records begin (in1994) between 1 July and 18 July is 6mm (1994) and the highest 168.8 in 2015. The readings average to 47.6 mm. So, very dry!

For temperatures the word that springs to mind is warm. Only 4 days so far this month have an average temperature below the mean of past averages for the date.

While only 10 days have recorded a minimum above the average for the date 6 of them have been more than one standard deviation above the average. No days were more than 1 standard deviation below the monthly average.

For maximum temperatures 14 days have been above the long term mean but only 4 more than one standard deviation above the average. No days were more than 1 standard deviation below the monthly average.

None of the significantly high minima and maxima have coincided. 3 of the 4 significantly high maxima occurred on days when the minimum was below average. However 4 of the 6 significantly high minima were followed by an above average, but not significantly so, maximum. 

Of course as soon as I compiled that post the weather changed! The maximum on 19 July, and both values on the 20th were all significantly below the respective long term mean values.  That made the 20th officially a Cold Day. 

On the 19th I went out for a bird prowl, hoping to find and photograph the Nankeen Night Heron at Bucklands parking area.  Couldn't locate it but got a reasonable image of a White-faced Heron taking off from a jetty.

I visited a few other spots to see what was around, and the answer was "not much".   At Betka a Magpie decided to try to bum some food but I had none.

Frances decided she needed to emerge so we went for a drive to the airstrip to see if we could relocate the interesting birds I had found on the 16th.  The only colourful birds around were Scarlet Robins on the airstrip fence (we did find a female Flame Robin behind the buildings, but they are not colourful).  The Epacris impressa in the unslashed parts of the heath was colourful.

Before we went out (about 1100hrs) I had loaded the stove with wood, thinking to light it about 1400hrs. Soon after returning home (about 1330) I heard a crackle: although it all looked black in the firebox there was obviously a live coal left over from the 18th.  This wasn't a biggie and I let it run.  By 1630 the first charge had died down so I added a large half-round of stringybark in a way that I hoped would get it to burn slowly.  It had caught well by 1715.

By 1745 it was very well alight and I wondered if it might burn too quickly.

However by having the door firmly shut and the damper closed it calmed down, and by 1923 there was  just enough smoulder to keep the warmth happening.

Still nice embers by 0720 on the 20th.  More fuel was added and the fire kept going through the day

A little before the fire was recharged the sunrise had been pretty spiffy,

Towards sunset on the 20th the cloud formation was attractive from our settee.  Taken with my iPad as I was feeling too relaxed - possibly should be spelt L... A ... Z ... Y - to get my good camera!  

Some better photographs, I think from Coulls Inlet, were on the MCN Facebook page: I hope folk who are not on FB will still be able to see them.

A walk of failures

 After our walk along the clifftops from Betka to Pebbly Beach we chatted with our friend Caroline about the possibility of getting to the next beach East of Quarry Beach at sea level.  She has done this at low tide and said it needs low tide and some luck.  The low tide forecast for 19 April was about as low as it gets for quite a while (although, at 0.16m, still a fair  bit above the 0.06m recorded in January-February).  So we decided to give it a go.

Here is a snip from Google Earth.  Airport Cove is the target.

The green line is my guess at the tide line on the day: the satellite snap must have been a very low tide.

The first issue that arose was that I had not realised that I had taken the SD card out of my small camera in the process of getting my new camera.  Fortunately I had my phone with me so a few photos were possible.

The first image is looking back to the West (ie towards the far end of Quarry Beach).

This is looking East - Airport Cove is on the far side of the headland.  It was obvious that wading around was not going to be possible.

At Quarry Beach with an inclination towards geology a photo of these strata is always taken.

A rocky outcrop on the beach seemed to have weathered very differently to those nearby.

They seem to have split along the lines of sedimentation.  It sort of reminds me of the appearance of onion exfoliation shown by granite boulders but I expect it is a very different process.

Pancake rock and friend, looking very different than when looked at from the clifftop.

I decided to have a shot at going over the headland as going around was not possible. I got about 2/3 of the way and it seemed to be getting a bit iffy for climbing up and with the rock being wet and  reasonable waves coming in ....

... I decided that whatsit was the better part of thingamyjig and retreated.  An unusually sensible decision for me.  The waves and clouds looked nice.

Having got looks of time on our hands (not that we were actually on a formal schedule) I went round to the SW corner of the airport to see if I could stir up some Beautiful Firetails.  Another failure, but at least I didn't try driving through the bog at the corner and get stuck (a likely outcome the way my luck was running).

Green Cape trip

 Needing to get fuel for the Pajero in the near future I noticed that the price of diesel at the cheapest place in Eden was 199.9c/l: 32 cents less than Mallacoota. Is the Mallacoota servo (or their wholesaler) working on a business plan that says they have a captive market so gouge it before the tourists leave? No surely not. 😂

There were also a few groceries we needed that would be better priced in in Eden, so off we went, deciding that we would call in to Green Cape on the way home.

The drive in to Green Cape was enlivened by crossing with a few Muppets who seemed to either think it was a one way road or not have worked out that it was a dirt. (Note from the future: on the way back I estimate we crossed with at least 15 cars, all displaying this quality of conductivity.)

Our first stop was Pulpit Rock which on our previous visit had been our first sight of the Shearwater migration. This time there were only about 50 here rather than the 10,000 I estimated last visit. Here is an optimistic shrub growing above the rock platform.

This is the view to the North.

A clip showing the colour of the water off the rocks and the pattern of the backwash.  The larger waves were breaking into the pool visible above the run off.

Definitely a Hakea: I suspect H. decurrens.

The most common shrub was Banksia serrata known as Old Man Banksia or Sawleaf Banksia.  Most plants had some nice flowers.  It being a National Park they are all still there.

A view over the heath.

Spot the birdie!  A New Holland Honeyeater: the closely related Tawny-crowned Honeyeater was Bird a Day.

We finished by driving down to the Lighthouse, which we found a lot more exposed to wind than Pulpit Rock or the heath.  There were more (~300) Shearwaters here as well as a Gannet and a Kestrel.