The Waters Around Rottnest Island - Snorkeling Little Salmon Bay

Little Salmon Bay is such a fantastic little gem hidden on the south side of Rottnest Island. The beach is tiny, which might be the reason for the relative modest number of visitors you will encounter when you go there. You are quite well protected at the beach with rock structures surrounding the sandy beach and extending out into the water creating a little lagoon. As you have probably already guessed, it is not the sand that is the reason why you go to Little Salmon Bay, but rather the water, or more specifically what is under the water!


Little Salmon Bay delivers some of the easiest and best snorkeling I have done in Australia. A shallow sandy entry into crystal clear water and you have a bathtub the size of a cricket ground full of fish, corals and rich water. As long as you stay inside the lagoon you will be well protected by the rocky structures and maximum dept is not much more than 5m, with 80% of the area at less than 3 meters.


Rottnest should geographically be too far south to support corals and many of the exotic fish we saw. However, similar to how the Gulf stream warms western Europe, the Leeuwin current brings down warm tropical water from the north keeping winter water temperatures at Rottnest significantly higher than what you can expect just 18km east at the mainland, typically 19°C versus 15°C. Along with the warm water comes a variety of tropical marine larvae of which the pink corals have established a foothold in Little Salmon Bay.


Lots of exciting fish! I think the one above is a Yellow Moon Wrasse and the little green fish below is Pretty Polly Dotalabrus aurantiacus, it was pure luck that I managed to spot it in the middle of some green algae. Afterwards it was very easy getting the photo, since the PP was so confident in its camouflage that it did not flee when I came in for a closer look. We also saw numerous Western King Wrasse - there should be a photo in the Picasa album.


Great stuff! Every time I visit Perth and Rottnest I use a bit of time standing in Sydney looking at my suitcase considering if it is really worth bringing snorkel, mask and flippers - it is quite an extra load to transport 4200km west and on your back while biking around the island, however, as soon as you get your head under the surface you know it is all worth the extra hassle! :-) Driving back towards the ferry we managed to get another quick little dip around The Basin before heading back towards Perth.

Rottnest Island - The Non-Feathered Land Critters

There is a good selection of land based non-feathered critters on Rottnest. The Quokka is probably the most famous inhabitant being directly responsible for the naming of the island. Dutch captain Willem de Vlamingh thought the quokkas looked like rats - I guess you did not need any biology degree to be put in charge of a flotilla in those days .. probably not today either(?) - Well, Vlamingh named the island "Rattenest" which is Dutch for "rat's nest" and over the years the name transformed into Rottnest.

The selection of reptiles on Rottnest is good, more importantly though is that your chance of seeing reptiles is excellent! The lack of dogs, cats and foxes and probably the fact that there is next to no traffic on the island has made the crawling inhabitants feel very safe. Particular in the afternoon they will happily present themselves out in the open, trying to suck the last bit of heat out of the tarmac road. So choosing to do a afternoon ride on your bike around the island can be most rewarding. Do not drive to close to the edge of the road and bring your camera :-)

Once again we managed to spot the local Bobtail subspecies called Tiliqua rugosa konowi, which is endemic to Rottnest Island. Also King's Skink Egernia kingii is a sure spot, I have never pulled out the lunch box at Cape Vlamingh (West End) without a specimen showing immediately afterwards :-)

We did not see any snakes this time around, but a great surprise was a line of Processionary Caterpillar, Ochrogaster lunifer, making their way across the road. Great way to prove that size matters :-) obviously they try to imitate a larger creature by forming a gap-less line, similar to how starlings seek protection in large flocks, "sort sol" and how striped catfish forms dense schools.


Excellent weather, some food heavy backpacks and time off - what more can you hope for? Out at Cape Vlamingh we were treated not only with the views of the Osprey family, but also with some hair raising performance by a couple of surfers in combo with helpers on two jet skis.


I have always though that it was cheating having a friend on a jet ski setting you up for the wave, but watching the battle against those waves at West End, I must admit that there was nothing looking like cheating there! Underwater reefs, massive surf and razor sharp rocks all along the coast - if it was me, I would have like a support vessel or two as well :-D

Birding Rottnest Island

As usual, a Perth trip (nearly) always include a trip across the water out to Rottnest Island and in similar consistent fashion it never disappoint. Well to be absolutely honest, I would have been happy to finally bag a Rock Parrot, but following the usual logic it would be sad to deplete such a nice area and bring into question the need to visit it again. ;-)

I have seen Common Pheasant (top photo) in Australia before - at least 3 times - but every sighting have been brief and on Rottnest, this time I managed to get a photo which qualified for the blog. This introduced bird has, very much like the Mute Swan in Northam, only managed to establish a foothold in a few select places - all of them islands.

Another old Rottnest friend is the White-fronted Chat. Last time I managed to get a less than impressive photo of a WFT darting across the path, this time we were truly in for a treat with a little family of not less than 10 feeding at the salt lakes in the middle of the island.


The salt lakes are normally a fantastic bird spot, but this time - end of April - there was very little to see, apart from the White-fronted Chats we only managed to see a couple of other waders; Red-necked Avocet and Red-capped Plover above.

Guess there is a season for everything, no Banded Stilts at the salt lakes this time, but instead we were treated with a little Osprey family living in one of the gigantic nests placed on reefs just of the coast. Every year there are 2 to 4 Osprey families nesting around Rottnest, instead of starting from scratch they will reuse one of the up to 70 year old nest "towers" which through generations have grown to abnormal size. Those of you that know the size of an Osprey - 50 to 65cm - will be able to judge the magnitude of the construction in the photo above.


All good! Rottnest was firing on all cylinders. No new ticks, unless one of my tern-knowledgeable readers can create a bit of excitement by naming the tern in the picture below, I would not mind if someone told me that it was a Common Tern race hirundo? But if someone insist on it being a young-but-not-juvenile Antarctic Tern, then it would be very exciting! ;-) These were the bird, but I will return shortly with a underwater and probably a miscellaneous report.

Rottnest Island - Miscellaneous

You cannot write about Rottnest Island without mentioning the little local macropod inhabiting the Island: The Quokka! Absolutely fantastic little cute animal that have had a hard time dealing with introduced predators on the mainland, but is doing very fine indeed on Rottnest, where there are no dogs, cats or foxes.

Another specialty of Rottnest Island is the King's Skink, which can quite easily be spotted around Cape Vlamingh - West End. The fellow in the picture about came out of its burrow as soon as we pulled out the lunch pack and did not leave till it was sure big Al had finished it all ;-)

Another feature of Rottnest is the presence of a number of rocky outcrops and reefs impossible to reach from land and therefore near perfect nesting spots for Osprey. A number of well established nests exist around the island and for every year they are utilized they slowly grow higher and more impressive. This year we were probably a little bit to early for the nesting season, but I have included a picture of an empty nest below. Using a long range zoom distort the feel of size in a photo - the nest is approximately 1.5 meters high!

It is always exciting biking around on Rottnest towards the end of the day. The heat of the tarmac attracts all kinds of exciting creatures! During my previous visits I have always seen snakes sunning themselves in the roadside. We had less luck with the snakes this year, but we were lucky to stumble upon the Bobtail or Shingleback below. In fact the little guy below is from a subspecies called Tiliqua rugosa konowi, which is endemic to Rottnest Island.

On the bikes it is a quite easy little island to get around on. During a full day you can easily manage to do a full loop and then still have time to return to a couple of favorite spots. Hills are easily negotiated, but one should be aware of the power of the wind! Even a pair of bike legs trained in the notoriously windy western Jutland will be challenged when mother nature lets the blowing begin around Rottnest - Those who think that I am exaggerating should take a close look at the photo of the "slightly" horizontal tree below :-)


Great guns! Enough for Rottnest this time and I will start trawling through the photos from our visit down in the big forests of south-west Western Australia. I can already promise that there was a bit of ticking-action going on and there were some seriously impressive BIG trees! :-)

Rottnest Island - Wildlife - Birds

I have been to Rottnest before - actually twice - but I have never really been going hard for the bird life. Last time I was there, however, I saw the Bridled Terns flying around at West End and must admit that if there was ever an epiphany bird moment during my stay in Australia that would probably have to be it. I managed to get a crappy picture of one of the flying Bridled Terns with my point and shoot and realized I would be needing to upgrade to something with more reach and less shutter lag - so those Bridled Terns have quite a bit to answer for ;-)

This year the weather was not on my side, but still there were lots of feathered action. As already revealed the inland salt lakes proved most rewarding. New habitat equals new birds! indeed 5 of them, 4 at the salt lakes and a White-fronted Chat at West End:
Sanderling
Red-capped Plover
Banded Stilt
Fairy Tern
White-fronted Chat

Apart from the new ones there were also a few good old ones that I have seen at Rottnest before, like the Bridled Tern that was slightly timid by the rain and therefore not as easily photographed. Also a couple of Banded Lapwing got sufficiently close for a tight crop.

The White-fronted Chat gave a bit of gray hair before it all worked out. At first we saw a female sitting facing away from us on the boardwalk at West End. I had absolutely no idea what it was, but I realized that it was something I had not seen before. After using a significant fraction of my lunch break running around trying to get a picture of the "mystery bird" I realized that I had changed the settings on the camera for a group shot and not changed aperture and ISO back so I had 30 blurry pictures of a grayish blob - not happy - The bird had flown off and I had no proof! While walking back after lunch suddenly a male bird landed in front of us, the male was very easy identifiable and I managed to get a few shots before it took off, walking another 3 meters and there was a sign alerting the visitor to the presence of White-fronted Chat in this particular area - how right that sign was :-D


Not bad at all, Rottnest delivered on all fronts and our Western Australia trip was off to a super duper start. A quick ferry ride home and there would be roast beef for dinner - Verdensklasse! :-)

Rottnest Island, WA - The Larsens On Tour with Our Own Local Guide

The main event of my dad's visit to Australia this year was a 5 day trip to the western end of Australia, One reason was to acquaint ourselves with the WA nature particular the area around Perth and the great forests in the south west end and in the case of my dad also to see the end of the world that spawned something as sweet as little G. :-)
We arrived Tuesday evening to a fantastic warm welcome and happily joined in on the festivities taking notes on how the Perth natives celebrate birthdays.
After a healthy sleep we were up at the crack of dawn heading off to Rottnest Island.

Public vehicles are not permitted on Rottnest so the transportation of choice is to bring a bike - or rent one in the largest bike shed of the southern hemisphere! Sometimes all that choice does not necessarily speed up the process of getting your gear and getting going, but after about 30 min of searching we had found the largest helmet of the southern hemisphere for dad and the bike with the fewest gears for Gemma :-D

We had planned to start out with a good push on the bikes out towards the west end of the island, this plan was nearly shipwrecked after only about a kilometer of riding where we reached Herschel lake one of the inland salt lakes that are enormously popular with a number of waders and hence also by BWs. After about 200 photos, 4 new species and only 20 minuets we (reluctantly) jumped on the bikes and once again began our endeavor towards west end ... 1km in 22min! - you could easily see that dad was worried :-)

Great ride! Straight into the wind and a fantastic opportunity to learn how to save energy by holding someones wheel ... However, Gemma decided to do her own regime of interval training instead; she absolutely blitzed it up the hills at maximum heart-rate ripping the peloton apart just to reach a absolute standstill while sounding like a high powered vacuum cleaner choking for air, the peloton would then catch up and overtake only to see her again and again pass at enourmous speed going full power for the next hill! :-D

After a well deserved break at west end, which included a fantastic well-equipped lunch pack and another new bird species (more about all the wildlife of Rottnest in another blog post), we decided to drive for cover! A few nasty rain clouds where coming in and in combo with a strong westerly winds it made the possibility of sitting in a cafe drinking cappuccino very tempting.

Weather changed nearly as quickly as we could finish our hot drinks and we headed out for the area around Parker Point to get onto a beach and take a look at what was going on underwater utilize the snorkels and masks that we had carried around all day.

We found a fantastic spot just north-east of Little Salmon Bay, facing east we were well protected from the wind and as can be seen from the pictures there were absolutely nothing wrong with the sand and water either :-)

Super duper day at Rottnest, great spot and since we did not see the Rock Parrot I am severely afraid that we will have to go again one day ;-)