Sorry folks, I didn’t manage to get out for a proper field visit this month.
I did however get these pictures of a Tawny Frogmouth (Podargus strigoides) nesting at Narrandera Common.
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Ecosystem: Woodland
August 2017 Field Visit – MIA1 & Narrandera Common
I have been so busy this month that I nearly didn’t manage a field visit, but with today being the last day of the month, the weather being nice, and my having no hugely urgent work that desperately needed to be done today, I decided to take a day off and go for a walk/drive out bush somewhere.
I further decided that ‘somewhere’ would be MIA1 – a former state forest reserve that is now part of the Murrumbidgee Valley National Park, and is located between Narrandera and Leeton. MIA1 is one of the sadly numerous reserves in the Riverina that I have spent my life driving past, but never actually visiting. I fixed that today.
June 2017 Field Visit – Galore Hill
Today I visited Galore Hill in Lockhart Shire. I visited Galore Hill last August, and it was a bit of a shock to realise that that visit was nearly a year ago now.
April 2017 Field Visit – Narrandera Koala Count
Today was the Annual Koala Count in Narrandera. I have been every year for the last several years, except when it’s been called off because of rain or flooding, and as I did last year, I decided the Count could be April’s official field visit.
February 2017 Field Visit – Berry Jerry
This month I visited another precinct of the Murrumbidgee Valley National Park: Berry Jerry.
Berry Jerry is located along the Sturt Highway between Wagga Wagga and Narrandera, and like many of the reserves in the area is predominantly River Red Gum (Eucalyptus camaldulensis) woodland, with a creek passing through it that feeds into the Murrumbidgee River. There’s a highway rest stop with toilet facilities located just outside the entrance, so it’s a good spot for a day trip. You can park in the rest area or drive into the reserve itself.
November 2016 Field Visit – Conimbla National Park
Last week I needed to visit Cowra for a day, so I took the opportunity to stop into Conimbla National Park for a while before heading home. Cowra is outside of the area identified as ‘Riverina’ on the map on my About page, but it’s within the federal electoral division of Riverina, so I decided that was good enough to count as a Riverina site.
Conimbla National Park is very pretty, prepare yourself for lots of general scenery shots. Also pictures of bark; I’m intrigued by the variety of colours and textures of bark, and there was a lot of very artistic bark on display in the portion of the Park I visited.
ACT Field Visit – Mulligans Flat
This weekend my parents invited me to visit Canberra with them. After a look around the National Museum of Australia, we headed out to a night tour at Mulligans Flat.
Mulligans Flat Woodland Sanctuary is an area of remnant Box Gum Grassy Woodland that is being managed to conserve and restore the entire ecological community at all levels. Non-native predators are actively excluded, rabbits are gradually being eradicated from within the reserve, and several locally-extinct native species have been reintroduced over the past few years, including Eastern Bettongs, Eastern Quolls, New Holland Mice, Bush Stone Curlews, and others. There are a large number of other native species living within the reserve as well.
September 2016 Field Visit – Narrandera Common under flood
I believe I have previously mentioned that this has been an unusually wet year – well it’s gotten wetter. All the creeks across the region are over-top, as is the river in several places, and there is so much standing water in paddocks just from rainfall that it’s impossible to tell if you’re looking at flooding from a waterway or not.
I was tempted to just drive around and take photos of all the water everywhere for this month’s field trip, but in the end I decided to head to Narrandera Common, so you can compare this month’s photos with ones I’ve taken there on previous visits.
With both Bundidgerry Creek and the Murrumbidgee River to contend with, Narrandera Common currently looks like this:
August 2016 Field Visit – Galore Hill take two
August has seen the return of the sun (well, on and off), so I decided to take advantage of a mostly-sunny afternoon to make another attempt at visiting Galore Hill.
You may recall that I attempted to visit Galore Hill in March this year, and failed to actually get there – it turns out it’s much easier to find if you drive down the right road.
