Cooktown

Check my birding map for specific location.

I am sorry to say that I didn't like Cooktown. I did not originally plan to visit but as I was close returning south from Cape York, I thought I really should go. I had lots of parrot photos to process and I wanted some downtime to plan my next move. So I went to Cooktown for 5 days. I stopped at the Keatings Lagoon on the way but I didn't like that either. It was beautiful and I saw my first Tropical Scrubwren there but there were warning signs about crocs telling you to stay away from the water. Unfortunately, the path to the bird hide was right next to the water. The loneliness and gloom added to the spooky feeling about the place and I went fairly quickly to the hide. I fair ran the way back, feeling a bit put out after only seeing some oriole and herons.

Cooktown looked like a perfectly nice seaside town. It had adequate shops and facilities. The caravan park was pretty run down but it had lots of trees and a bush area at the back. I think the problem was that everything I had read about Cooktown said it was a birding mecca, that there were heaps of species and I would be tripping over them. Not so.

I started at the botanic gardens which were very pleasant and cool. A walk out the back led to Finch Bay Beach and I followed that through the bush. No birds. No birds. I couldn't believe it. The whole place was so quiet it was like being back in New Zealand! I only saw a couple of honeyeater on my way to the beach. Things improved there where I found a white morph Reef Heron which was working the mangroves. I watched and photographed that for a while before returning through the gardens. Still no birds. I tried other tracks with similar results and I was so disappointed.

White Morph Reef Heron (egretta sacra)

Back at the caravan park things improved with a pair or Wompoo Fruit Dove lower down the canopy than I would expect. Did I mention how unrelentingly windy it was in Cooktown. It never stopped. I think maybe all the birds had been blown out to sea! Anyway, the Wompoo provided some stimulation over the next few days and I met a fellow birder Jim Gill who is a parrot expert. I was glad that he was as disappointed as I (in the nicest possible way). There had been sightings on eBird of pitta in the caravan park recently but try as I might, I couldn't find any.

Wompoo Fruit Dove (ptilinopus magnificus)

One day I was walking along the sea front which provided a little more variety of birds and I came across a dark morph Reef Heron which was so interesting after seeing the white morph. Another thing to research - why these morphs?

Dark Morph Reef Heron (egretta sacra)

As a last resort I drove into the Mount Cook National Park. The access road was twisty and along a lane I saw only 2 houses. One had a 20 foot dragon in the garden and the other had swastikas on the gate. The howling silence of any birds and the unsettling feeling about the locals saw me hightail out of Cooktown!

eBird Lists

https://ebird.org/australia/checklist/S113699363

https://ebird.org/australia/checklist/S113632622

https://ebird.org/australia/checklist/S113577987

https://ebird.org/australia/checklist/S113485263