Uploads from aaardvaark, tagged willandra, with geodata

Blue Bonnet 1

nobody@flickr.com (aaardvaark) — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 01:12:01 -0700

aaardvaark posted a photo:

Blue Bonnets were created on the fifth day so it was fitting that on the fifth day at Willandra I took up my biggest challenge - to get some photos of this somewhat frustrating bird. And that on my fifth day back at home I got to the digital darkroom to extract some satisfactory shots of them.

Blue Bonnets are difficult as you might expect because they are shy and flighty, but also because they have strangely coloured and often disheveled plumage. They fly at the sight of an approaching photographer, then fly again when a lens is raised. Then even though they are now a very long way away, they will avoid succumbing to your monster lens by scampering up the branch until hidden by leaves. And even if you catch one unawares for a fleeting moment, you look at the resulting image and think there must be some mistake because the colours and shapes are all wrong and there's shadows of branches twigs and leaves all over them.

I spent four hours in a 10 hectare patch of bush in which there were many Blue Bonnets, lugging Big Bertha from one spot where some parrots had just flown but were no longer visible to another, and another. But I was happy in the end to have the considerable satisfaction of getting a couple of actual images out of hundreds of attempts, even if the shadows, twigs and unruly light have not been entirely neutralised.

Previous effort (in which they were flying away) is here www.flickr.com/photos/ozjulian/4031925256/ .

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Spiny-cheeked Honeyeater

nobody@flickr.com (aaardvaark) — Mon, 09 May 2011 23:40:04 -0700

aaardvaark posted a photo:

A lovely looking honeyeater - one of the few honeyeaters of any kind we saw on this weekend, in the homestead garden area.

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Red-capped Robin

nobody@flickr.com (aaardvaark) — Sat, 07 May 2011 00:48:19 -0700

aaardvaark posted a photo:

Two more Red-capped Robins, not on wire this time. This is a male, I'm still not sure if the other is a female or immature.

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Blue Bonnet 2

nobody@flickr.com (aaardvaark) — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 01:11:57 -0700

aaardvaark posted a photo:

The story of these photos is under Blue Bonnet 1.

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Chestnut-rumped Thornbill

nobody@flickr.com (aaardvaark) — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 17:18:05 -0700

aaardvaark posted a photo:

Two views of the tiny Chestnut-rumped Thornbill at Willandra NP, part of the old Big Willandra station. Big Willandra features in Banjo Paterson's "Flash Jack from Gundagai"

Although a first for me, these were very common at Willandra.

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