Birds apparently start early in the day ignoring the fact that Queenslanders don’t have daylight saving, so we had to start our day at 6.45am for a bird walk. This was billed by O’Reilly’s as an early morning bird walk, so the title fitted though it was us doing the walking, not the birds …. The guide started outside the main entrance with a bag full of bird food and the birds knew the routine. Regent bowerbirds and king parrots were there waiting and once food appeared a male and female satin bowerbird and currawongs appeared as well.
While the bird has no connections whatsoever with the UK, the name does as it is named after the Prince Regent of the UK. The bright yellow and black male is completely different to the female which is a plain brown bird with fawnish markings. This means that they are known as a sexually dimorphic bowerbird and appears to be the reverse of what happens with males and females in Essex. The male and female can be seen together below …
The walk was a little artificial as the birds were attracted by the fact that the guide had food, but we did also see king parrots (which did their best to act as hairdressers for the group), yellow robins, a whipbird and also a satin bowerbird by its bower. All bowerbirds build bowers to impress the females. These bowers are stick structures which are then decorated by the males. The regent bowerbird mixes a muddy greyish blue or pea green “saliva paint” in their mouths which they use to decorate the bower and they then add shells, seeds, leaves and berries. The satin bowerbird on the other hand likes blue. Anything blue will do – apparently even $10 notes have been found in front of bowers! The bird itself looks almost black and it is light diffraction by the surface texture of the feathers which gives a kind of deep shiny blue metallic sheen.
The walk finished around breakfast time and after breakfast we headed off to do the Box Forest circuit. This took us along the border track initially and then down some fairly interesting (and steep) bits of track to Canungra Creek. On the way are some very impressive specimens of Brush Box. This is a native evergreen and its Latin name is Lophostemon confertus. Less of a mouthful is its more common names which include brush box, Queensland box, Brisbane box, pink box, box scrub, and vinegar tree. We also saw some of the local residents on the way.
We then followed the creek back up the valley doing a couple of diversions to some lovely waterfalls, the last of which was Elebana Falls. In total we did around 7 miles, though it felt like that was 3.5 straight down and another 3.5 straight up again ….
