AUSTRALIA: NORTHERN TERRITORY, Pine Creek to Darwin

Sulphur-crested Cockatoo

Oct 1: Today we are deep in the Northern Territory of Australia, about 250 km south of Darwin, in the small town of Pine Creek.  We savored our last full day of the main part of the tour in these northern reaches of the country, amidst a landscape of hot, dry, savannah woodlands dotted with scenic, rocky outcroppings.  We awoke in our lovely little “railway carriages” to enjoy a selection of bread, jams, fruits and juices that our local co-guide, Barry, had set out for us, with accompanying cereal, coffee and tea.

A walk around the town of Pine Creek produced our first Hooded Parrots, along with six other parrot species:  Northern Rosella, Little Corella, Sulphur-crested Cockatoo, Galah, Red-collared Lorikeet and Red-tailed Black Cockatoo. We took another look at the Grey-headed Flying Fox colony that we’d seen last night, and visited the impressive bower (display area) of a Great Bowerbird, featuring a tidy, open space with small grey stones at the entrances.

Honeyeaters, Australia’s largest family of bird species, continued to be numerous, with Brown, Blue-faced, White-throated and White-gaped Honeyeaters all showing well. Barry decided to demonstrate boomerang-throwing on the cricket pitch grounds, but it didn’t work out exactly as expected, as the boomerang did not return to him!

Leaving Pine Creek, we began our journey back to Darwin, stopping frequently as we worked our way northward.  We found hundreds of Galahs ground-feeding in a short grassy area, and watched them all fly off to another spot.  A roadside stop highlighted a Black-breasted Buzzard, and two Wedge-tailed Eagles cruising over a ridge. While watching the raptors we also found White-winged Triller and Varied Lorikeets.

We stopped at the Adelaide River War Cemetery to find a variety of birds, including a very friendly Silver-backed Butcherbird. Lisa found the first of several Rufous-throated Honeyeaters amongst the more common Rufous-breasted Honeyeater.  We watched in amazement as a Collared Sparrowhawk picked off a Cane Toad right from the claws of a Black Kite.  The cemetery was a sobering reminder of the impact of World War II on the Northern Territory. 443 people died as a result of Japanese bombing raids from 1942-1943.

We lunched at a Subway, which is not so unusual for birders, but this one was inside a suburban mall!  We looked unsuccessfully for a reported Rufous Owl at a nature park, but found a Tata Lizard and a number of butterflies including Chocolate Argus and Common Crow.

Our last stop of the day was at Buffalo Creek, a northern suburb of Darwin, on the edge of the Timor Sea, to scan for waders on mudflats.  While walking through the tropical woods and mangroves leading to the beach, we had wonderful looks at Red-headed Honeyeater, Green-backed Gerygone and Pale Yellow White-eye. The mudflats at low tide were well-exposed, and we edged far out on the mud to enjoy closer views of Lesser and Greater Sand Plovers, Grey Plover, Terek Sandpiper, Great Knots, Bar-tailed Godwit, and Ruddy Turnstone, as well as 3 species of Terns – Little, Gull-billed and Caspian.

For dinner we returned to the Yacht Club at which we had dined many days ago, for another excellent meal outdoors, and reminiscing about the many wonderful memories of our two-week tour ‘Down Under.’  We bid fond farewells to Janis, Vicki and Lisa, who were not joining us on the trip extension to Western Australia.
all photos © adrian binns