Departure from Lamington and Arrival in Brisbane

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We started with the morning bird walk of course with the third guide who I had not done a walk with yet, and it was roughly the same route as the previous ones but it was really interesting to see the same birds and the same environment presented in three completely different ways but all by very knowledgeable and experienced guides. Today though the guide seemed to be more of a birder than a general person interested in nature because he referred to 'birding' rather than 'birdwatching' and asked me what species I was 'chasing' in Lamington National Park and what stuff I still 'needed' and using various other subtle birding terminology throughout. Just a little observation that I thought I’d include.

There wasn’t anything new seen on this walk, but one of the whipbirds did come a long way out of the forest and down the road with us

and we were also taken to a very large Brush Turkey mound in the staff accommodation area which was considerably bigger than previous ones that I had seen. After the birdwalk we went back to check out of the room and while I was eating a snack on our balcony a large number of King Parrots flew over onto the railing to say goodbye. I suppose the way parrots say goodbye is by trying to steal your food.


After we checked out of the room, we still had over an hour until our transport was due to arrive at nine so we left our bags in reception and went off for one last short walk which I did enjoy, you can’t get tired of the amazing forests at Lamington National Park. The Eastern Yellow Robins are a joy to watch, and Logrunners are just awesome. This is all coupled with the incessant sound of whipbirds and the machine gun calls of the Lewin’s Honeyeater. The Pademelons are great too. So in case it wasn’t obvious from that, I loved Lamington National Park. Not a cheap place to stay unless you’re camping but I enjoyed my time there very much. I’d have loved to spend longer if I had the time and if I could afford it!

The same car and driver that brought us up three days ago arrived right on time so we headed off down the same road winding its way down. The highlight of the journey down was a Brown Quail that ran across the road right in front of us and luckily the car was going slowly around a tight bend so I had enough of a look to identify it (and we didn’t run it over!). Also seen on the drive once we were back in the outer suburbs of Gold Coast was a White-faced Heron in a field by the side of the road. Now that was a very overdue year-tick! We were dropped off at Nerang Station in Gold Coast (you may recall from a few posts ago that the coach company that was supposed to take us cancelled so we couldn’t be dropped off in Brisbane and had to be dropped off in Gold Coast instead) and we planned to get the train right up to Roma Station in Brisbane which was directly opposite our Brisbane hotel. Easy. Well, actually it wasn’t quite as easy as that. The railway was being repaired or something so there was a bus service replacing the train which took considerably longer and was a bit of an annoyance because it wouldn’t take us to Roma Station but dropped us off at Central Station requiring another train to get back. A bit of a pain and a waste of time but not so bad.

It was early afternoon by the time we got to the hotel so we were able to check in before heading off to the Botanic Gardens for the rest of the day. These were really rather nice gardens on the banks of the river and as well as formal gardens there were a few interesting things like a mangrove boardwalk and a lily pond. The most common bird in the gardens were Noisy Miners and there were loads of them around. There were also many large Australian White Ibis in the palm trees and a few Grey Butcherbirds, rather than Pied as I saw in Gold Coast. And there were many Rainbow Lorikeets flying around too. It wasn’t too long though until I saw the main bird that I went to the Botanic Gardens to see. In the main lawns there were many little patches planted with trees and in these areas there were many Bush Stone-curlews just sitting there, it was rather surreal to have these amazing birds just sitting on the lawn in a garden in the middle of the city.

In total I saw fourteen bush Stone-curlews sitting around on the lawn.


The other two parts that were particularly interesting were the lily pond and the mangrove boardwalk. There were several large Eastern Water Dragons

on the lily pond as well as common waterbirds and a very large eel which was a bit of a surprise. In one of the palm trees next to this pond there was a Blue-faced Honeyeater which wasn’t new, but was a longer view than in Gold Coast which I enjoyed, and also not new but also a longer view than in Gold Coast was a small group of Scaly-breasted Lorikeets around a nesting hole as well as many Rainbow Lorikeets. And while I was watching the Scaly-breasted Lorikeets which were in a nice exposed place, I heard the screaming call of the Bush Stone-curlew which was nice to hear, and I saw the birds making the call too which was due to a small child walking up to them.

The mangrove area was also very interesting. The only birds there were some Silver Gulls, Noisy Miners, and a Little Black Cormorant on the river but the mangrove plants themselves were really cool with their little pneumatophores and generally awesome structure and the ground of the mangrove was covered in lots of little fiddler crabs, many of which were waving their big claws around. Really a lot of fun to watch.


That was pretty much all of the animal stuff, but the plants and garden are really nice and there was a macadamia tree planted by the superintendent of the Brisbane Botanic Gardens in 1858 and the first planted by Caucasians so ‘represented the birth of the world macadamia industry’ which was quite interesting.

After we had seen the gardens it was still fairly early but there wasn’t much else to do that day so we went to a shop to buy food for the next three breakfasts and also had dinner in a food court before having a relaxed evening and going to bed because we were both very tired after doing a lot in Lamington.

New birds seen:
Brown Quail
White-faced Heron
Bush Stone-curlew

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