Newsletter August  2007         
In this newsletter:-                                 Weather
                                                                    Fruits and Flowers in the Forest
                                                                    Two special Palms from Cape York
                                                                    In the Garden
                                                                    Birds
                                                                    Mammals
                                                                    Quiz

Weather
This has been the coldest winter on record for this part of the world depending on how you measure it. 1984 was also a very cold winter.  Still some of the tourists have no respect for our severe weather, turning up in shorts while I am wearing two coats and regretting not having put my thermals on! The large number of frosts have had an impact on numerous revegetation projects but it is too early yet to say how many trees will recover by shooting from low down. At the moment the weather is perfect, cool nights and warm sunny days though if you are in the breeze today and not in the sun it is a little cool. A bit of rain and warmth have helped to green the grass after the frosts.

Fruits and Flowers in the Forest
Last year the Red Cedars lost many or all of their leaves in the cyclone in March and so put out new growth in April. This April they shed those leaves. It seems that 13 months is the most you can get out of a Red Cedar leaf. This deciduous period is early for them and most are now well into bud and spring is bursting out all over. The White Cedars fruited later this year than normal and proved very popular with the larger frugivorous birds. Now the birds are finishing the last of the Lemon Aspen, Achronychia acidula and A. aborans. These white fruit the size of a large marble make great jams and are used by a local dairy to flavour one of their yoghurts.

Queensland Blue Gums are in flower and bud at the moment. The lorikeets are enjoying the nectar along with masses of honeyeaters. In New South Wales this same tree is known as Forest Red-gum. After the second world war there was a shortage of timber and some rationing so a black market developed, often in timber which was 'green' or unseasoned. This led one wag to remark that, "Blue gum was being sold as red when green on the black."

Umbrella Trees are just about to break into bloom so they will be next to be targeted in a big way. Around the village and along some of the creeks bottlebrush are providing some nectar. In the high altitude rainforests Blair's Malletwood and Aceratium furrugineum are both in fruit. These two trees are remarkable for the rusty hairs which cover their leaves.

Two special Palms from Cape York
Comments from a friend have lead me to add this segment. He was walking on the western coast of Cape York and remarked on the huge numbers of dying Palms. This was the species Corypha elata. Growing to over 25 metres on the otherwise low relief flood plain country of western Cape York, they can form thickets or scattered stands hundreds of metres long. The large dry fronds make these thickets a noisy place to visit in a wind.

At the end of its life each of these palms puts all its energy and stored resources into one massive breeding event. The flowering branch emerges from the top of the tree which then sheds its remaining fronds. This 6 to 8 metre cone of tiny flowers carries a sweet scent and produces huge quantities of small fruit. The palm then dies.

The other palm I wish to highlight is the Mangrove Palm, Nypa frutecans. This palm lives in salt or brackish water where its branching trunk is usually below the high water mark. The buoyant fruit are borne just above the waterline and a dispersed in the current. This species extends from northern Queensland through the Northern Territory to the Philippines.

In the Garden
Last year we had Spotted Catbirds in the citrus and, feeling sorry for them because of the effects of Larry, we left them alone. Thankfully they did not return this year. Sulpher-crested Cockatoos, King Parrots and bowerbirds are messy, destructive eaters. Helmeted Friarbirds on the other hand always finish one fruit before beginning another; I would much rather share with them. One day in early August we had both an immature Golden Bowerbird and Satin Bowerbird in the garden. The Satin was into the mandarins. The cockatoos are educable. With persistence, much yelling and a bit of stick throwing they learnt which trees were for me and which one was for them. Working from home was a help in being on hand to deal with them from the start.

Pacific Bazas nested in the village last year and a pair are doing the rounds. As I write this they are in the garden looking for stick insects, katydids and frogs. While I like the above animals I am happy to feed a few of them to the Bazas, particularly the katydids which are eating my plants.

An Echidna was a surprise visitor while I was talking to some Belgium birdwatchers. I reacted too slowly and it dug itself under a cement path so we could not get a good look at it. They are very powerful diggers and are capable of holding firmly onto the earth.

Many of the trees stripped during the cyclone are making some progress in recovering their crowns but it is still possible to become sunburnt when working in areas which used to be deep shade. Our Techomanthe vine is a wonderful show of pink tubular flowers like inverted hands of bananas. The honeyeaters access the nectar by breaking through the flowers near their base where the nectaries are. Without the moths with the huge proboscis of the pollinators in PNG, our plants do not set seed. The vine is native and has hung on in one small area by vegetative layering. The Purple Powderpuff, Syzygium wilsoni wilsoni, is in heavy bud.

Birds
Still no sign of Golden Bowerbird activity at the Longlands Gap site. At another site at similar altitude on private land we saw one piece of new lichen in the bower and signs of new twigs being recently added. Nearby we observed a female pick fruit from a Blair's Malletwood and take it off in the same direction on three of those occasions and nearly so on the fourth. She flew back in from that direction also. Could she be feeding young already even though there has been no male displaying (that I know of)? The fruit are about 1.5 x 2.5 to 2 x 3 cm so are large for such a small bowerbird. If it is going to young they must be close to fledging.

Topknot Pigeons and Whompoo Fruit Doves have just about finished off the last of the Lemon Aspen Fruit at the mid altitudes. While there are not many fig trees in full fruit, the absence of Barred Cuckoo-shrikes and the difficulty in seeing Double-eyed Fig-Parrots have been remarkable. Large flocks of young Magpie Larks are gathering on the wires and are often joined by Common Mynahs.

Sarus Cranes and Brolgas are back in good numbers and feeding on the paddocks bare of their maize crops. Magpie Geese and Plumed Whistling Ducks are covering the shore at Hasties Swamp. Just up the hill on Hasties Road is the haunt of a Red-backed Kingfisher. Little Kingfisher are being regularly seen at Tarzali Lakes Fish Farm. Often just behind the Platypus and below the Nankeen Night-Heron. There have been more Sacred Kingfishers here this winter than is normal. Blue-winged Kookaburras can be found near Hasties Swamp and the rail crossing on the way to Granite Gorge.

On one great day’s birding from when I picked up my new friends, Celeste and John, until I dropped them off in Yungaburra we saw 95 species with another 10 heard. I must point out that it was not a vigorous day of mad twitching but a relaxed journey and stroll through some beautiful high altitude rainforest, tall wet sclerophyll forest and some eucalypt woodland. Of course there was open farming country as well. From Yungaburra we drove via Bromfield Swamp. Here we saw both species of cranes and a Collared Sparrowhawk. Before reaching Mt Hypipamee where we were joined by three others we added Crimson Rosella to an expanding list.

Grey-headed Robins and Brush-turkeys greeted us in the picnic area and a Golden Bowerbird shone overhead. A surprise here was two young Square-tailed Kites. The Fern Wrens seen two days before did not show. Nor did either of the two Cassowary which call this piece of forest home. The rangers have had to chase them off as idiots will insist on feeding the birds. This endangers both the birds and people.

After a walk to the crater we moved to some high altitude forest with emergent Blue Kauri (see the last quiz). The highlights here were Mountain Thornbill and a male Grey Goshawk which posed on an exposed branch.

Heading south we added more rainforest and eucalypt species to the list. Lunch was eaten in Ravenshoe.

At Kaban we visited a farm dam and the state forest. An adult Square-tailed Kite circled us and the nearby trees for about ten minutes. White-bellied Sea-Eagles had two well developed young in the nest and the dad came in while we were not watching.

Back in Yungaburra as we were shifting items between cars a pair of Pacific Bazas was seen as they searched a tree for tucker. One was observed to eat a green tree frog. Fourteen raptors, what a great day!

One of the most remarkable things of the day was the quality of the sightings. The birds were close and cooperative. An exception to this were the Little Lorikeets which stayed hidden except for dashing raids across our field of view and sometime only heard. Identification was made only because they were so small and there was the absence of any warm colour under the wing.

Mammals
The tree-roos on Peterson Creek have been seen quite regularly. Nikki has been seen on the town side of the creek with her new young one a few times now. One small female which lives near the Curtain Figtree jumped out in front of us while we were birding there one morning. Her male offspring now lives opposite the car park but is not easy to find. On my site Jill and Joan continue to be the main stars but they were all absent without leave when a Channel Ten documentary team came to film them. The next night we sighted four, with Joan performing like she had been to modelling school. Dorothy's joey from last year has been seen a number of times on our side of the highway but I suspect they are both still crossing the road. I am not happy about this and worry for their safety.

We have not seen many Giant White-tailed Rats of late but have been hearing their threatening grinding of teeth. We have a new record for Green Ringtail Possum sightings. On the first of August we had 20 sightings of what were probably 18 individuals. Platypus have been showing well in the lovely little village of Yungaburra.

Quiz
This month a set of tautologies taken from the website at http://home.earthlink.net/~misaak/taxonomy.html so those who cannot wait for the answers can check themselves. The following scientific binomials repeat their meaning, often in Latin and Greek. Your task is to work out what so special about these animals that is mentioned twice in their names. 

Anous stolidus (brown noddy)
Ardea herodias (great blue heron)
Asio otus (long-eared owl)
Brachyramphus brevirostris (Killitz's murrelet)
Cygnus olor (mute swan)
Diceros bicornis (black rhino) 
Equus caballus (horse)
Arctostaphylos uva-ursi (bearberry)
Tayassu tajacu (peccary)
Toxotes jaculatrix (archerfish)
Tragopan satyra (Himalayan pheasant)
Upupa epops Linnaeus, 1758 (hoopoe)
Ursus arctos (brown bear)
Xiphias gladius (swordfish)

From last newsletter a colour quiz:-
This newsletter questions about colour. I'll give you two scientific names which refer to the same colour, you decide on the colour. For bonus points what are the common names of the organisms concerned?
1 Agathis atropurpurea, Petrogale purpureicollis The colour purple, Blue Kauri (a tree), Purple-necked Rock Wallaby
2 Hersperilla flavescens, Antechinus flavipes  The colour yellow, Yellow Sedge Skipper (a butterfly), Yellow-footed Antechinus (a vicious marsupial carnivore a little bigger than a mouse)
3 Melaleuca argentea, Dleias argenthona    The colour silver, Silvery Paperbark (a tree), Scarlet Jezebel (a butterfly)
4 Nacadubia cyanea, Malurus cyaneus   The colour deep dark blue, Green-banded Blue (butterfly), Superb fairy-wren
5 Areda alba, Petrophassa albipennis   The colour white, Great Egret, White-quilled Rock-Pigeon
For a double point bonus which of these organism's name is composed of three colours? Melaleuca argentea where the black (mela) and white (leuca) refer to the bark and argentea to the silvery leaves.