Check my birding map for specific location.
As well as the Red Gums Track, I wanted to walk some of this track. It is a short way back up the entrance road to the campground and I thought it would be a good spot for the rarer endemics of the area.
The track itself was a deep orange, flattened sand. No good for my van but ok to walk on. It was quiet though, particularly having just come from the rowdy campground and its tracks. About half a kilometer in, I saw a honeyeater sitting up and was very pleased to see it was a White-eared Honeyeater. It sat and sang.
White-eared Honeyeater (Nesoptilotis leucotis)
Nothing else much was moving or singing and so I turned around. At the entrance to the track, I heard a melodius call. I try to learn the calls of local birds as I get very annoyed when I hear a call I don't know. This one was new but I immediately knew it. The Shy Heathwren. The bush lining the road was dense but I could peer through the bottom of it. I didn't get the heathwren but there, sitting in a patch of sunlight was the Southern Scrub Robin. And just for once, my view was unobstructed.
Southern Scrub Robin (Drymodes brunneopygia)
And right behind it was the heathwren. I couldn't get a shot but a great sighting nonetheless.
Back on the road in the warming sun, I found a bearded dragon. It sat very still and let me photograph it.
Central Bearded Dragon (Pogona vitticeps)
I returned a couple of days later to this area to look for the heathwren again. I heard and saw the scrub robin and I hung around for a while before hearing the undoubted call of the heathwren. Then a reply from the other side of the road. Raptures!
The birds called to each other for a while until one broke cover and darted out toward the other. They then chased each other around for a while - oblivious to me!
Shy Heathwren (Hylacola cauta)
eBird List
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