• Corellas
    • lab2
Dec 8: Runways and flyways
 

I started the day not long after dawn at Archerfield Airport. In my now well-practised routine, I stopped at three sites (1,2,3) and scanned the airfield. Nothing mega was present, although there were some decent counts – at least 160 Galah, 87 Australian Magpies and at least 32 Masked Lapwings. Sadly I couldn’t turn any of the lapwings into Banded! Time was short since I needed to be home at 0730. So I finished up at the airfield, and dropped in to Granard Wetlands for a quick look (eBird list here). Again nothing mega, although I had the first record of Black Kite for this site, which has now had 75 species. Not bad for a very unprepossessing roadside park.

In the afternoon, I headed to the Wynnum-Manly foreshore to do a migratory shorebird survey for work. I started at Lota and finished at Wynnum, counting shorebirds foraging on the intertidal flats at low tide. In some ways, counting and birding don’t go desperately well together, since time is limited for the fieldwork and I needed to push on from site to site. Still, I had 15 Black-tailed Godwits viewed from the end of Nelson Parade, a bunch of Tereks at Lota, and a Ruddy Turnstone at Dreveson Park. Overall, not huge numbers of shorebirds present in the area today, although it was good to see 180 Black Swans and 25 Whiskered Terns (all adults) at Wynnum.

With no year ticks today, my year list remained stuck on 303 species. I spent 3 hours 39 minutes birding, walked 0.943 km and drove 82.3 km. My chronological year list is here.