Short-billed Black-Cockatoos in The Hills East of Perth

Short-billed (White-tailed) Black-Cockatoo aka Carnaby's Black-Cockatoo is one of the endemic birds of Western Australia. It is not as difficult to find as its very similar Long-billed cousin (aka Baudin's Black-Cockatoo) and every time I have seen them, there has been a good size flock of them. This early morning in the hills east of Perth I was particular lucky spotting in total more than 50 cockatoos foraging the tree tops in small groups, giving very little attention to the shutter pressing, big smiling Dane running around down on the ground - What a great bird!


Conditions were absolutely fantastic, cold crisp morning air and since the birds did not mind me, I was free to walk around under the trees getting the best angle for the photos. Great start to a big day.

It is a peaceful place up in the hills away from all the shenanigans of the city, so peaceful that even the birds are more relaxed. I have seen Common Bronzewing many times, but usually I find them very difficult to approach without scaring them away. The male above, however, allowed me in close - who is watching who?

I have to include a kangaroo once and a while - at least for my international readers :-D and to remind myself of how different it is down under. I have lived down here for nearly 5 years and once and a while it is good to remember some of the things that stunned you when you arrived. I can reveal that Moreton bay fig and Australian White Ibis are on the list for a fresh off the plane Dane walking the Sydney parks.


After some excellent birding I decided to change to the macro lens and take a closer look. I am quite happy with the insect in flight shot above - if just the bee had turned around! ;-)

All good, great morning - temperature had started rising and it was looking like another warm day in WA, we were heading further inland for one of the most quirky ticks around: Mute Swan in Northam.

Back in Sunny Perth - Kings Park

Those Perthians did quite well when they decided to make space for Kings Park in their city :-) Fantastic park that offers everything from (nearly) real wild bush to overpriced sandwiches shops with pond view. ;-)

The most visited part of the park also doubles as a Botanic Garden. There are some seriously impressive trees and plants. One of these is the Boab Tree in the picture below, despite its 750 years of life experience, it is a newcomer to the park, only just arrived last year after making the trip from the north end of WA - 3200 kilometers - lying down behind a truck! Read the story and see the pictures.

This year we used a bit of time examining a very impressive exhibition of Kangaroo Paws - genus Anigozanthos. I have seen many of them in Sydney where they are very popular garden plants, what I did not know was that the family is endemic to the south west of WA - so I guess having them displayed in Perth makes sense.



Quite happy about the yellow one above! Conditions were absolutely fantastic for taking photos - lots of super warm afternoon light and you just had to press the trigger and hope something was in focus :-)

It was all very fantastic except from a birding point of view! Yes, yes - I know a little flock of Short-billed Black-Cockatoo is a great spot except I have already seen them and had instead hoped to see some of the more common - but still exclusively western birds - like Western Yellow Robin and the W. Spinebill, both birds that are very similar to their Eastern counterparts but different enough to qualify as other species.

After a warm day in the park we hit the beach ... compared to Coogee I must admit the sand/people ratio was slightly better .. i.e. Lots(!) of sand and next to no people :-)

The first picture of this post is a panorama, it is stitched together from 3 pictures, feel free to click the picture and you will be taken to a high resolution version.