We have three spectacularly coloured birds in the Moggill Creek Catchment that have similarly beautiful colours, but very different lifestyles.

 They are the Rose-crowned Fruit-Dove, The Noisy Pitta and the Rainbow Bee-eater.

Rose-crowned Fruit-dove – © Ed Frazer

The Rose-crowned Fruit-dove visits from the end of September and leaves around Easter each year to move to warmer areas up the coast of Queensland although I have experienced one overwintering in Brookfield. They breed while here in a nest that is not more than a few sticks in the fork of a tree 5 metres or more off the ground. They lay just one egg.

The diet consist mainly on native fruit and they prefer small purple/black fruit which they swallow whole. They also will take small figs and Lillipillies.

Despite their brilliant colours they can be well camouflaged, and they crawl through the branches of the trees in which they are feeding. They are surprisingly abundant in the catchment and have two quite distinctive calls that give their presence away. I am sure they are prey of some raptors such as Sparrowhawks and Goshawks and unfortunately, they are frequent victims of our window strikes.

Noisy Pitta – © Ed Frazer

The Noisy Pittas don’t live up to their name in the Catchment as they seldom call during the winter months when they are here. They come down from places like the Toowoomba Range and the Bunya Mountains where they breed in the summer and where they call incessantly while raising their young.

The Noisy Pitta is always associated with dense leaf litter where they forage for insects and worms. They are a very wary bird as they have to be on the lookout for danger which is unfortunately mainly domestic cats in the Catchment. By September they have gone back to higher ground and I am not aware of any staying in our area over the summer.

Rainbow Bee-eater – © Ed Frazer

The Rainbow Bee-eater is the only one of the trio that frequents the Catchment all-year-round. In the 1970s and 80s they were very common around our paddocks and often lined up along the fences from which they made darting sorties to catch the bees that make up the main portion of their diet. By 2000 they were seldom seen or heard so I encouraged my family to keep beehives and now we see them frequently and we also get a plentiful supply of honey.

They breed communally in tunnels made in the sandy banks of the Brisbane River. They are often heard before they are seen, and they make an attractive rolling drrrrt sound as they gracefully dart around catching bees. They are said to eat other insects such as wasps and dragonflies, buy I see them only eating bees. I am not aware of any serious dangers to the species and they are widely spread around the coast of Australia.

In November 2019, Ed Frazer introduced us to a young Platypus family who also call his property home. As breeding season commences in August 2020, Ed updates us on his playful residents:

---

It has been 12 months since I started monitoring the platypus in the two big pools in Gold Creek, which borders my property in Adavale St.

I have regularly observed and photographed the two youngsters that were bred in the 2019 season. They emerged from the den in November 2019. One was attacked and wounded and it has now repaired its wounds.

One of the platypus hatchlings from late 2019

 

I haven’t seen or its sibling since July 3, and my overall sightings have greatly reduced since the end of June. Before then I regularly saw platypus every day.

Lately their behaviour has been different, with the platypus travelling large distances between each dive. Their usual feeding pattern is a series of short dives about 45 seconds apart or feeding half out of the water where the leaves build up along the edge of the creek without any rapid change of position.

I assume the change of behaviour is due to the start of the breeding season.

Some of the large platypus I have observed have possibly been males travelling the creek to find mates.

I am pretty sure the youngsters from last year have been driven off, probably by their mother who is preparing for the next family. She would not be inclined to tolerate the youngsters as from now to November as she will need all the food she can get to produce the huge quantities of milk she will need for the next batch of growing babies.

I think last year’s youngsters will have moved to find un-populated territories of their own.  I did see what could have been one a few days ago in the pools near the junction of Gold and Moggill Creeks. I would not be surprised if they work their way to repopulate the upper reaches of Moggill Creek.

Our last MCCG Platypus Survey showed that there were no platypus in this part of Moggill Creek because the water level had been depleted by drought and excessive pumping. Hopefully this year will see a return of the platypus to the area.

The female that raised the two last season has used the same birthing den for many years. It is directly below one of my hides so I can keep a good track of her. Even if I don’t actually see her, I can often detect her movements from the bubble trail she often leaves on the surface.

I did not detect her between July 5 and July 20. I think she will have laid her eggs and is now curled up in the den hatching them. Even after they hatch she will only leave the den for a short time to feed and that will probably be in the middle of the night so I doubt I will see her over the next month.

The platypus mother, November 2019

By September the young will have grown enough that she will have to go out feeding regularly and I’m sure when we have the 2020 Platypus Survey in early September she will be observed as she has been nearly every year. Last October she was out late in the mornings and once I saw her at 2pm on an overcast day.

Hopefully I will see the young again as they emerge from the den in November. It’s quite likely they will add to the population of platypus we are monitoring with our Annual Survey of the Moggill Creek Catchment.

---

Ed’s previous Platypus observations:

Platypus pictorial December 2019

Will our platypus families survive?

Family life Platypus style! November 2019

---

To find out how to register for the 2020 survey, follow this link: PLATYPUS SURVERY Sunday 13 Sept – Register NOW!

All photos are the copyright of Ed Frazer

Lately we are having a Butterfly Bonanza! The seasonal conditions have been perfect for a build-up of butterflies to numbers we haven’t seen in years.

What is adding to their presence is they are being concentrated on the few plants that are in flower at this time.

There is the usual big influx of migrant species such as the Lemon Migrant and the Caper White.

Caper White – © Ed Frazer

The Caper Whites are very variable and all colour forms are present. The migration seems to be much later this year as they usually one of the first butterfly species to arrive.

The Lemon Migrants are also very variable and both the light and dark forms are present this year.

Lemon Migrant – © Ed Frazer

In 2020 we are seeing a few Yellow Migrants that are far less common. They have yellow underwings and white forewings on the upper-side.

Yellow Migrant – © Ed Frazer

This year has again been a bumper year for Blue Tigers. They are infrequent migrators, but when they do come they appear in large numbers. A few seem to be permanent, but migrations bring in the big numbers such as we have this year. Little is known of their migration movements.

Blue Tiger – © Ed Frazer

Another migrant is the Scarlet Jezebel. Some breed locally on Mistletoes, but large numbers come in from the south. When they are flying their upperwings are visible and they look like a plain white butterfly. When settled their spectacular colours are on display. They prefer the Red Bottlebrush flowers whose scarlet flowers show up that the butterfly’s colours are more crimson than scarlet as their name suggests.

Scarlet Jezebel – © Ed Frazer

Of the resident species the Varied Eggfly is doing well, with lovely blue rings on the male’s upper wings.

Varied Eggfly – male (left) female (right) – © Ed Frazer

 

Another spectacular resident is the Blue Triangle.

Blue Triangle – © Ed Frazer

Among the less common species that are around in good numbers this year is the Glasswing.

Glasswing – © Ed Frazer

There are two day-flying moths with the butterflies that are interesting. The Hawk Moth flies with very rapid wing beats – so fast that even with my camera on a shutter speed of one two thousandth of a second there is still some wing movement in the photo. It hovers less than a second at each flower and sucks nectar with its exceptionally long proboscis making it very difficult to photograph.

Hawk Moth – © Ed Frazer

The Crow Moth mimics the Crow Butterflies. The wing pattern is very similar and when encountered it will spread its wings to show its full pattern.

Crow Moth – © Ed Frazer

Photographing butterflies is not easy. I find it more of a challenge than photographing birds. I use a 300mm lens, but any zoom lens would be suitable. I find with my 500mm lens it is too difficult to keep the butterfly in view as they don’t stay still very long.

They are active when warm in the middle part of the day which makes shadows a problem on sunny days, so warm overcast days are the best.

I find that later in the afternoon some species are slowing down and easier to capture.

I recommend setting the aperture well open at f2.4 to f5.6. This will allow the butterfly to be in focus and the background will be less distracting as it will be nicely out of focus. If you can find flowers at the edges of trees so there is a nice even background some distance away as in the Scarlet Jezebel photo above.

Plenty of patience is needed so a take a chair and wait and soon some butterflies will arrive on your chosen flowers. Don’t bother trying to take photos of butterflies in flight. Even if you succeed they don’t have much appeal.

Right now is your best and probably last chance to get some good photos of butterflies for entering in this year’s MCCG’s Photography Competition.

Recently (April 2020), I have been trying to attract the platypus in our part of Gold Creek to come for a feed of crickets and mealworms.

No luck so far but I have an eager line up of six eel-tailed catfish, the gigantic eel, five short-necked turtles from penny size to dinner plate, one kookaburra and seven water dragons.

The water dragon is the MCCG’s emblem and Moggill Creek was named after the water Dragon – Magil in the local Yuggera (Jagera) Nation language.

The current scientific name for the water dragon is Intellagama lesueurii which translates to “Intelligent lizard”, a well-deserved name for an animal that has lived as long as the crocodiles – about 20 million years according to the fossil record.

I go down to the creek about 30 minutes before dawn most mornings.

Within minutes I hear huge splashes as the water dragons belly flop into the water off the branches high in the trees overhanging the creek, where they have spent the night.

Usually you see just their head protruding from the water as they swim eel-like to the bank powering mostly with their tails which are twice as long as the rest of their body. Climbing up the vertical banks is no trouble and by the time they reach my hide they have drip-dried with no sign they were just out of the water.

Usually there is one large male with his big triangular head, drooping yellowish jowls and bright red underside.

He is accompanied by the dominant female, usually three smaller females and a single juvenile male, just showing red, who keeps much to the periphery of the group.

If I keep up plenty of food they all get on well and think nothing of walking on each other or on me to get an insect.

When the food supply is a bit slow the male will chase off the young male who usually escapes back into the water. Sometimes a warning is given by the male “saluting” rapidly to the young one and he waves back slowly a gesture of submission.

The dominant female will also keep the younger females in check with head bobbing or a determined aggressive move in the transgressors direction.

The young here always emerge in the first week of January, so mating must be early October as the eggs take three months to hatch. They are laid in sandy soil on the creek banks and usually 8 to 10 in a batch.

The young avoid the older water dragons and feed on small insects among the leaf litter. Like the adults they climb the trees at night and rest on the smallest branches to avoid predators. Only a few survive the predators that include brown tree snakes, kookaburras and even older water dragons. Unfortunately I have also seen domestic cats using them as play things.

The larger Water Dragons are said to eat figs and Lilli Pillies, but I have never observed that, but I have seen them eating flowers.

They will often stay in the water with just their heads out when the air temperature is lower than the water temperature in the early mornings.

I can attest to their very sharp claws as a small one climbed up my leg leaving four blood spotted tracks.

I can also report that the smaller ones can “walk on water” when they want to cross the creek in a hurry. They are not as good at it as the Green Basilisks (Jesus Christ Lizards) I have witnessed in Costa Rica, but they are pretty impressive with the noise and effort they put into the performance!

When swimming they mainly have their heads out of the water, but they can go much faster fully underwater, which they do to escape the big male.

Wild water dragons are generally thought to be very hard to observe as they splash into the creek well before you manage to see them.  They will appear if you sit quietly and wait.

I find that they quickly are attracted to insects and they have very good eyesight.

They will watch from 20 metres away and I throw an insect towards them whenever they make a forward move.

I find it only takes about 15 minutes and I can attract them right up to me so I can feed them by hand.

By late May they disappear and I understand they hibernate in burrows they dig and seal up until they emerge in Spring.

Why not put on some insect repellent, take a seat down to their name sake creek and get to know our intelligent lizards?

 

Return to Bush Bites

With the dry so bad I have been concentrating my wildlife photography to the two large holes of Gold Creek that border our property.

Of course, the Platypus are the main interest, and now that the pups are growing I am finding the mothers are out feeding frantically through the day. One was out at 2pm in the second week in November!

Now is definitely the time to go watching Platypus!

Find the best spots by looking at the locations where they’ve been sighted in our annual Platypus Survey. Take a chair and just sit quietly and wait! Early in the morning or the last hour before sunset are the times you are most likely to see them.

Watch out for lots of bubbles rising to the surface and often a stream of mud being brought up from the bottom of the creek. I find they surface about every 45 seconds while they are feeding.

If you are lucky one will stay on top of the water to chew on the creatures it has stored in its cheeks.

But there is plenty of other life up the creek!

We have several Sandpaper Figs hanging over the water and one very old one has a huge crop ripening at present.

Every few minutes a ripe fig will fall into the water and it can be a torrent of figs falling when a flock of Fig Birds and Orioles start feeding in the tree.

Under the water are a number of Eel-tailed Catfish and I think one has a nest there too.  I am not sure if the fish eat the ripe figs or the creatures attracted by the figs.

Another that hangs around the same area is a good-sized eel. They are ultra-designed and can move with the slightest effort.

The creek has a large number of Water Dragons.

Each has a territory and there are frequent standoffs between territory owners. The area “owned” is relative to the dragon’s size and I think the males get a bit more as they appear to be more aggressive.

The Water Dragons were not to be seen as they were hibernating until late August and then they were mostly sitting on the banks or in branches of trees sunning themselves. Now it has heated up they spend much of their time in the water with just their heads poking out.

The eerie “whoo-hoo” calls of the Powerful Owl can be heard across the ridges and valleys of our catchment, especially during the evenings and nights of Autumn and Winter when they breed.

These birds hold a special fascination for birdwatchers and the general public because of their large size (Ht. 65cm; Wt 2Kg), their booming calls and their fondness for relatively large prey including possums, sugar gliders, currawongs, magpies, lorikeets and flying foxes.

They also have the peculiar habit of roosting quietly and in complete stillness during the day, with their previous night’s prey dangling from a claw below the branch they have roosted on.

But they are also a species that is classified as “vulnerable” in Queensland.

The magnificent Powerful Owl – © Chris Read

For these reasons, Birdlife Australia is conducting a Citizen Science Project to establish numbers, distribution and breeding success of this magnificent bird. The Project Manager is Rob Clements.

The project is only possible because these apex predators are moving into the suburbs of our cities to exploit the numerous prey available. They have become easily detectable by their calls.

It is easy to hear the calls but far from easy to locate the birds themselves, especially if the call is coming from up to half a kilometre away in a very bushy area where they roost and breed!

This is where triangulating can be useful – locating a bird calling at an unknown point by accurately measuring the compass directions from known points A and B.

The following Google Earth image shows a hypothetical implementation of the triangulation procedure:

The location in the image is Gap Creek Reserve. It has been used for illustration purposes only. It does NOT show the actual location of a known spot where a Powerful Owl is located.

Triangulation explained

To commence the triangulation process, two birders in phone contact stand at points A and B, which are 97m apart. When each of them simultaneously hear the Powerful Owl call they measure the direction with the compass on their smart phones. A measures the call coming for 73°E and B measures the call coming from 31°NE.

When these measurements are taken home and plotted on Google Earth, they can mark the location of the calling Powerful Owl.

In this illustration the owl was 136m from birder A, and 133m from birder B. The wavy lines plotted on the map follow the terrain and show the “ground length”, the length one would have to walk, climbing the hill to the Powerful Owl point.

The map length is the direct straight length between two points and is not plotted in this image.

How we use triangulation

Local birders Ian Muirhead and Jim Butler know the general location of a breeding pair of Powerful Owls along Moggill Creek from recordings of the owl’s calls at night.

Ian and Jim recorded their calls twice in March, 7 times in April, four times in May, and then they did the triangulation process on 10 June.

Within two days Ian and Jim found the Powerful Owl near the nest hollow on private property, having gained the enthusiastic cooperation of the land holder.

Since that time they have visited the nest site on a number of occasions.

On a day during the second week of August Ian and Jim were near the nest at 5:30pm. They saw the female first as she arrived at the “butchery” tree roost.

Minutes later the male landed beside her with a fruit bat dangling from its claw. The male then proceeded to rip the bat apart and feed sections to the female, beak to beak. After about ten exchanges, the female flew to the nest hollow and Ian and Jim could hear the chick trilling as it was fed.

Like to learn more?

If you would like to receive a recording of the Powerful Owl call by email, and/or you can hear Powerful Owls in our catchment and would like to contribute to the Citizen Science Powerful Owl Project, please contact Jim Butler at [email protected]

Return to Bush Bites

It’s July 2019 and the recent rains have turned up some ant mounds that are conspicuous in mown lawns in the Moggill Creek Catchment area.

They are made by Funnel Ants, a small honey-coloured ant that is common in soils that do not have a lot of clay.

The mounds are made after rain has flooded their chambers, which in dry periods can be a metre or more under the surface.

© Ed Frazer 

When conditions are good the funnel ants build shallow chambers in the root zone of the grass. They bite into the grass roots and feed on the sap that flows out. Funnel ants do not have a bite that hurts people.

The males and fertile females (Queens) develop with wings and fly in November to mate. The Queen lays eggs that all hatch as females and they build up into a colony of workers by late January.

Heavy infestations will damage the growth of lawns and they are difficult to control. Commercial pest control companies have access to products that give reasonable success, but these insecticides are not available to domestic buyers.

If you want to see the funnel ants you have to dig quite deeply as they only come to the surface while they are cleaning out their chambers after rain.

Or you can view an image and learn more about these ants, whose scientific name is Aphaenogaster longiceps, by heading to the Australian Museum website.

Return to Bush Bites