Collared Kingfisher

Sunday morning was the highest tide for the year and we had planned to kayak around to the Mullens roost and get some photos - just as we did last year. However, when I went out at sunrise this is what the sky looked like - and a couple of hours later it was even worse! The weather was certainly not so bad that we couldn't have gone but the whole point of the day - for me anyway! - was to get some good photos and this was definitely not going to be possible with the dark conditions. We went out on a similar tide last year and the photos then were great.
As Neil said we decided instead to go out to Inskip Point. She has shown photos of how far the tide inundated the roads and campsites around there and also some of the birds we saw. I was interested to find out if there was any of the sand island off the point still out of the water. One year ago during very heavy storms the island completely washed away and was only exposed at low tide. Within the year it has again built up. However, there was certainly not much of it out of the water and as we watched most of the birds flew off and over towards the eastern end of Fraser Island. (The photo shows Godwits and a couple of Great Knot flying.)
The highlight of the morning for me was to see a Collared Kingfisher! I have hoped to see this bird for a long time and have frequently tried to imaginatively turn a Forest Kingfisher into the one I was hoping for! The tide had made a shallow pool in under some casuarinas and there were two kingfishers diving down into the water to retrieve prey. We think we heard a third one but by the time we located the birds there were only two there.
It turned out to be a very interesting morning even though we didn't get perfect weather to kayak out on a perfect tide.