Local Birds

Extra to last week's post.  After I wrote the last blog post I read on the Birding-Aus forum that numbers of Sooty Terns had been blown by the storm into places all along the coast.  Then this morning Denis from The Nature of Robertson sent me this link to an article from the Sydney Morning Herald about Sooty Terns that have been handed in to the wildlife hospital at the Taronga Zoo. There is a great little piece of video on the page and an interesting article about where the Terns have most likely come from. Thanks Denis, it's well worth a look. 

Soon after sunrise this morning I went down to the bay at Mullens for a walk along the foreshore.  I hoped I would see some interesting birds for this week's blog post.  However, I had not taken enough notice of the tide time or height and I found the little creek was too deep for me to risk walking through carrying my camera.  The light on the bay at this hour of the morning is always beautiful so I did not count my very short walk as wasted effort.

There were piles of leaves and sticks all along the shoreline where they had been dropped by the tide and the waves which were pushed in shore by the storm last week. These piles are lots higher than even the highest tides of the year would be able to push them.

I was unable to find any interesting birds to photograph at Mullens this morning so I am posting some that I see regularly around my house.  Brown Honeyeaters are around here nearly every day. They are tiny (12-16cm or 5-6+inches) but easy to find because of their very loud song.

White-throated Honeyeaters are very similar in size (13-15cm) but not as easy to see. They are quieter and get chased off by the Brown Honeyeaters whenever they come into the same trees or bushes. I seldom see the Brown Honeyeaters on the hibiscus flowers but the White-throated Honeyeaters seem to prefer them.  This hibiscus is one of the older forms and the flower is smaller than most.

For more bird photos from around the world visit Wild Bird Wednesday.