Bird bath visitors Feb 15, 2009

Garden Island wildlife

Garden Island carpet python in good hands.

If you need a good reason to join Birds Australia then the program of events organised by the Western Australian BA group is surely one of them.

Boyd Wykes of the Defence Support Group (Dept. of Defence) lead a trip to Garden Island on Feb 14, 2009. Thankfully the day turned out to be cloudy and not too hot. The birds were quiet, But we got to handle one of the local reptiles, a 2 metre long female carpet python. Also the insight into what the Defence people are doing in the area of environmental protection was well worth the effort of getting up at 5.00 am. Bird-wise is it encouraging to hear of the thriving Fairy penguin colony of 200 breeding pairs that have estabilished themselves there, amidst the Navy ships and submarines. Fairy terns are also breeding on the island.

The trip promo and plan for the day was:

"This is one of the few opportunities to look at the bird life on Garden Island. Meet at the Garden Island Causeway at 7:30 am. We will car pool from there to reduce the number of cars on the island. It is proposed that we visit the following sites: Bouche View, Beagle Road beach, the small boat harbour to see the penguin colony, some history and some forest at Stirling’s Well and Gilbert Point for waders and terns. We may be able to swim there. We will visit Point Atwick for Osprey. We will have lunch at Cape Markham where there is shade and toilets."