Terns at Inskip

This post is for World Bird Wednesday.

While I was out at Inskip Point yesterday afternoon I saw a small flock of terns roosting on the sand at the point.
Crested Terns have been away nesting on islands off the coast but this flock had a mixture of birds at all stages. Some were in scruffy looking non-breeding plumage, there were a few that had almost full breeding plumage and there were some very noisy juveniles as well. I also saw two Little Terns which looked extra small standing in among the much larger Crested Terns.
I always think that Crested Terns are extra noisy and this flock was noisy and unsettled. Birds kept flying off and then coming back to rest again. This is a juvenile bird.
This photo shows why the flock was so disturbed. I was focused on the bird that was closer to me but the one in the background has a fish in its beak.

Endangered Little Tern

This post is for World Bird Wednesday.

Sometimes it's not the quality of the photo that counts but the fact of a photo record at all!
I was out at Inskip Point last week photographing shorebirds and rather as an after thought I turned around to photograph some of the Terns. There were four kinds there - Caspian, Crested, Common, and Little Terns - and I wanted some record shots. One of the birds I photographed was a Little Tern with a lot of breeding plumage and even a beak that was yellow with the black dot at the end. This didn't make sense to me at this time of year so I sent the photos on to an expert in Terns and the word came back that I had photographed one of the endangered Australian Little Terns on its way north to breeding grounds.
We see lots of Little Terns here but they are the population that breeds in Asia and flies south to spend summer here. The population of Australian Little Terns only migrates within Australia. Unfortunately they are having a hard time breeding successfully as the beaches they use are also used widely by humans, and dogs, and (south of here) introduced foxes.
Inskip Point is recognized as an important shorebird roost but finding an endangered Little Tern there makes it even more important.
Added Later: After a number of comments I thought I should add that there are laws here in Australia (as well) protecting nesting shorebirds. Also there are volunteers that do their best to protect Tern nesting sites. Unfortunately, it only takes one careless person with a dog off-leash! There is also a problem with enforcement of "no-go" areas. Unless there is a ranger with legal powers some few ignore signage! Sometimes I despair!!

Red-necked Stints and Little Terns

This post is for World Bird Wednesday.

It was a beautiful morning out at Inskip Point. The small shorebirds followed the receding water as the tide went out. Even though the water was only a thin film across the sand, there was no wind and the reflections were perfect. There were numbers of Red-necked Stints (Calidris ruficollis). Some were still in their non-breeding plumage but others were showing red breeding color around the neck and down their front. These are the smallest shorebirds to visit Australia in our summer and they breed in northern Asia - such a long trip for such small birds!
Roosting with them in the shallow water were numbers of Little Terns (Sterna albirons).
This is the smallest tern we see here in SE Queensland. There are two distinct populations of Little Terns that we see here. One population stays in Australia all year and breeds here. The other population migrates here for the summer and breeds in northern Asia. The first photo shows a bird in breeding plumage and the second photo is one in non-breeding plumage. The birds I photographed are part of the migrating Little Terns. Some Little Terns breed in Japan and I hope they find there are still places for them away from the areas of devastation.

Ready to Migrate

I was out at Inskip Point the other day at high tide. It wasn't the highest tide of the cycle and I was interested to see that a small part of the sand island out from the point was out of the water.
I could see some of the larger waders and terns clustered out on the island, but since there was a large flock of small waders and terns right on the point there could not have been much room out there. There wasn't much room on the Point either as there were vehicles driving to the end of the Point to catch the barge to Fraser Island as well as several car-loads of people fishing.
The flock of small waders was made up of Red-capped Plovers and Red-necked Stints. Most of the Stints were showing some signs of breeding plumage. My birding books say that the amount of rufous color varies greatly with some showing very little but all getting a necklace of dark streaks across the lower breast. To see photos of non-breeding birds refer to my post of January 14
There were also a number of Little Terns roosting with the small waders. These look so very small but their wings certainly are not! Some of them were in breeding plumage and some in non-breeding. I am not sure if these non-breeding birds were from the northern hemisphere flock or from the birds that breed down in south-eastern and southern Australia and then come northwards for the winter. The bill in breeding birds is yellow with a black tip.