It was a superb spring day when I took Alexandre birdwatching well east of Perth! I picked him up in South Perth where the city views over the river were gorgeous! He was working in Perth for a few weeks and it was his first time to Western Australia.
A beautiful view of the Perth skyline from South Perth while waiting to pick Alexandre up!
Alexandre had already enjoyed a 5 hour “maximum birds” tour with Perth Birds and Bush and had seen 66 species on that tour. He discussed having a full day tour to see some more bird species but to get further out of Perth to see a different landscape. We decided together to travel east visiting a few Wandoo sites and a Wheatbelt Town on the Avon River – Brookton.
With the long distance to travel we only stopped at four birdwatching sites. The first was a one hour drive east of Perth and we were lucky to see some super birds including: Painted Button-Quail, Red-tailed Black-Cockatoo, Western Rosella, Rufous Treecreeper, and the gorgeous Blue-breasted Fairy-Wren. We were also lucky to see some Carnaby’s Black-Cockatoo’s on our way to the reserve and able to stop and enjoy good views of this endangered species.
The Blue-breasted Fairy-Wren is a stunning wren found in the Wandoo Woodlands near Perth.
Next stop was a small park in Brookton it was a good spot for honeyeaters but unfortunately the Brown-headed Honeyeaters were darting around too quickly for Alexandre to get good views of them.
We bought lunch at a local café and then went to the river to eat and have a walk along the river to look for some birds! We saw a quite a few but the best was a number of Western Corella’s and a young Rufous Treecreeper.
Western Corella are an endemic south west Australian bird species and seemed as curious of us as we were of them!
This young Rufous Treecreeper was having a lot to say!
We then went to a very large nature reserve called Boyagin Rock. This is a great patch of Wandoo tucked away among the large wheat, sheep and canola farms. On the way to the rock we were lucky to notice a farm with several Australasian Pipits and White-winged Trillers feeding. But this was especially lucky as when we stopped to look at them, we were able to watch a Brown Falcon flying low over the farm! It made several sweeping flights while we watched.
You can walk over Boyagin Rock and will often see Ornate Crevice Dragon, which has to be one of the most attractive lizards in this area.
At Boyagin Rock Nature Reserve we saw quiet a few bird species. Even though it was a warm afternoon the birds were still busy calling and feeding. Alexandre was very taken with the Red-capped Robins. Who wouldn’t be? But he also liked the Crested Pigeons, Red-capped Parrots, Galahs. Australian Ringnecks, Splendid Fairy-Wrens, and Scarlet Robins.
Red-capped Robins are always a favourite!
It had been a long day and time to return to Perth. We had seen a total of 59 species during the day and had added 23 new bird species to Alexandre’s bird list. Including a majestic Wedge-tailed Eagle on the return journey!