Garden birds in Castlemaine

Posted on 2 February, 2013 by fobif

Damian Kelly has contributed this article on birds in his Castlemaine garden. To see previous posts by Damian on garden birds, click here and here.

This summer has seen a much reduced number and range of birds in my garden in Castlemaine. Honeyeater numbers in particular are well down. However, by providing water we still get a reasonable variety of birds in the garden. 

The Blue-faced Honeyeater seems to be getting more common in this area. A small number have been resident in Castlemaine continuously since at least early Autumn. They can be seen along the street trees in Mostyn and Lyttleton streets, as well as in gardens in this area. They have a distinctive call.

Blue-faced Honeyeater

Another less regular visitor is the White-eared Honeyeater. It has a strident call that can be heard long before you see the bird. Although not common around town, you will see them if you add water bowls in protected spots in your garden.

White-eared Honeyeater

I like watching the Yellow-faced Honeyeaters – they are quite curious and you can often get up close to them. This one is having a good preen after bathing in a water bowl on a hot day.

Yellow-faced Honeyeaters

To me, the Eastern Spinebill is one of the most appealing of the honeyeaters – it can hover to get at flowers and is partial to a range of natives as well as introduced plants. Quite a sight when you get to see views like this.

Eastern Spinebill

Although not often seen in gardens, Woodswallows are often to be seen in groups in the sky hawking for insects. They have a soft, chattering call that comes from on high. Here is a male and female White-browed Woodswallow pair. 

Woodswallows

 

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Rosella fledgings display their colours

Posted on 31 December, 2012 by fobif

Several Eastern Rosella fledgling recently fell out of a nest box in John and Marie’s yard at Golden Point. They landed in saltbush below where the adults fed them for a week before they finally flew off.

One of the Rosella fledglings. Photo by John Ellis, December 2012

A week or two previously Doug Ralph also discovered young Rosellas. This time they had stayed in their nest box.

Photo by Doug Ralph, December 2012

To see even younger Eastern Rosellas have a look a Geoff Park’s site here and here. In this brilliant sequence of photos, Geoff has recorded the transformation of chicks from nestling to fledging stage over a 25 day period.

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Comeback

Posted on 15 December, 2012 by fobif

The cup moth caterpillars have come in their millions and munched away, but it seems that they’ve gone to pursue their careers as moths, and the bush is responding accordingly. Green shoots are appearing everywhere, and things aren’t looking anywhere near as desolate as they were a month or so ago.

Fryers Forest, early December: new growth in the eucalypts is an indicator of the disappearance of the cup moth caterpillars.

 

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Catch this

Posted on 12 December, 2012 by fobif

North Central Waterwatch has released a handy Fish Field Guide for waterways in the area bounded roughly by Donald in the west, Creswick in the South, Heathcote in the east and Swan Hill in the north. Native fish are little known and it’s a bit of a downer to find out in the guide that 10 of the 22 species in this region are listed as endangered. Threats to native fish include, among others, removal of woody debris and riparian disturbance: another argument for careful restoration of our waterways.

Expedition Pass: a population of Macquarie Perch has been released here as a conservation measure.

Fishing is one area where conservation and recreation have an uneasy relationship. For this reason it’s of interest to note that 10,000 Macquarie Perch were released into Expedition Pass a couple of years ago with the support of local anglers. Macquarie Perch is an endangered species found in catchments to our east. It is described in the guide as ‘likely to have historically occurred in the Loddon River basin’, and the stocking is an attempt to re establish it in the area.

As of December this year the population at Expedition Pass is reported to be doing well. We believe it’s not legal to fish it here. [‘Macquarie perch can only be taken from three waters in accordance with strict catch limits and a three month closed season: http://www.dpi.vic.g…macquarie-perch ‘]

The guide can be got from the Catchment Management Authority in Huntly.

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Burning season under way

Posted on 25 November, 2012 by fobif

With DSE starting burns around Castlemaine, it’s worth clarifying what the Department’s targets are. The following has been supplied to us by DSE for land within the Murray Goldfields district:

Zone: 1. Asset protection 2. Bushfire management 3. Landscape management 4. Planned burning exclusion
Area total 8,322 ha 59,119 227,846 56,716
Area annual 1,664 5,912 6,092 0
Burn rotation Every 5 years Every 10 years 37 years plus 0

In his reply to FOBIF’s question of the safety value of the five percent target, DSE Executive Director, Fire [Lee Miezis], sought to create the impression that Asset Protection burns, those most directly concerned with human safety, had been vigorously pursued, while Landscape Management burns in remoter areas were relatively softly pursued.

It’s clear from the above table that nearly half DSE’s fuel reduction burns in the Murray Goldfields district are in remoter areas. FOBIF’s view [like that of the Royal Commission Monitor], is that the effort put into these exercises would be better spent doing a more effective job in areas closer to settlements.

This more effective work might, for example, involve fuel reduction through methods other than burning [grooming and slashing, for example]–but these can be time consuming and labour intensive.

Part of the problem is that Royal Commission recommendation 56 was for ‘prescribed burning’, not ‘fuel reduction’. There are other ways of reducing fuel than setting fire to the bush, but we have found that there is confusion in the DSE itself about whether fuel reduction by, for example, grooming 50 hectares of gorse, counts towards the five per cent target. The result is a drive to burn regardless, and the government is apparently unwilling to review this policy.

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