To Dryandra!

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Before I start the Dryandra day today, I'll briefly talk about yesterday which was very interesting, but probably best included with this post rather than on its own post.

During the afternoon, I visited some parks in the Perth city and saw a number of birds that are really cool and unusual for Perth but not new for the year including Gilbert's Honeyeater, and Little Eagle. Also particularly exciting, and a lifer, was a Baillon's Crake. I assumed it was a Buff-banded Rail at first which I have seen in wetlands in Perth city before, but it was actually a Baillon's which is cool.

Also in the city, in the evening I went spotlighting in King's Park which was very cool with Southern Brown Bandicoots, rabbits, a Common Brushtail Possum and, most excitingly, a Tawny Frogmouth which was only my second ever sighting and this one was perched low on a visitor sign and sat there letting me go right up to it while it stared at me with bright orange eyes. Really cool.

This morning, I headed off to Dryandra Woodlands to spend two nights there to come back on the day of my evening flight to Singapore. I'm staying in the Lions Village in the middle of the woodland itself, and I'm travelling with an aunt and uncle who live in Perth who have taken me down for the weekend.

There were a few interesting birds seen from the drive, but by far the most exciting was my first ever wild Emu. This is on par with the Tawny Frogmouth that was a lifer in Darwin as a super-long-awaited lifer that I had just never seen in the wild before. This one was in a light woodland and was definitely wild, unlike the occasional ob that I've seen in fields that seem to be kept as farmed, though I wonder if these are occasionally wild birds. I'm happy to put it on the list now anyway, finally.

We got to Dryandra Village in the late morning and then went for a walk to see what wildlife could be found. Obviously the numbats are the big thing, but they're quite rarely seen. They are seen occasionally though. Much more common are echidnas, of which I found one, and there are lots of cool birds like Rufous Treecrepers and Purple-crowned Lorikeets too. There were also some different honeyeaters to those I normally see in the Perth city and suburbs. Although there are lots of very cool birds that are easily seen, some like the Malleefowl and Shrike-tit are much more difficult to find and I haven't found them as of yet.

The Dryandra Village is a very nice location with a lawn that's covered in grazing kangaroos and at night, Common Brushtail Possums and it's right in the woodland itself.

After an afternoon walk, we went to visit the Barna Mia animal enclosure. This is a four-hectare enclosed area with a predator-proof fence that holds six species of small nocturnal mammals. Two of which can be found wild and Dryandra Woodlands and four of the which were formerly found here and are now extinct. The former are the Southern Brown Bandicoot and Brush-tailed Bettong and the latter are Bilby, Rufous Hare-wallaby, Western Barred-bandicoot, and Burrowing Bettong. It's $20 per person to do the night walk, and it involves going to each of three feeding stations where pellets and fruit are put out to entice the animals in. These are captive animals of course, and there are only about 25 individuals in the enclosure which are fully managed, but they are species that you'd never see outside an enclosure and are really cool. We saw all of them except the two bandicoots. The Western Barred is quite difficult to see and is rarely seen, but I did see one when I visited Barna Mia 6 years ago.

As well as the expected animals, there was also a large Brushtail Possum that was not supposed to be in the enclosure and it was gorging itself on the pellets. Possums are really common throughout Dryandra, I even saw a mother with a baby on its back which was cool.

Later that evening, I went spotlighting for a few hours from the accommodation at Dryandra Village going up and back down the Lol Gray Trail a bit and along the road and up what was probably a fire break. Kangaroos and Brushtail Possums were absolutely everywhere, and the night was very productive for spotlighting, although it took a few hours for stuff to start coming out. There are a lot of target night mammals at Dryandra that I would really like to see, though I thought they might all be very difficult so I'm pleased to have seen a few. I managed to get a brief view of a Brush-tailed Bettong which is one of the species in Barna Mia that is also found in the woodland. At one point, they were extremely common and could be seen easily, but their population has crashed recently and they are now much harder to find, but still about, clearly. The two wallaby species - Brush and Tammar - I believe are also in the situation and used to be common but are now much scarcer and I didn't find any that night. I also got a very brief view of a Brush-tailed Phascogale which bolted from the torchlight (which seems to be the normal behaviour. Maybe this is a case where a red filter would have helped?) so I didn't really get to watch it. It's borderline of the sort of sighting that you can count or not, but my policy is that if I've seen an animal well enough to be certain of the identification, I count it.

And finally, crossing the path in front of me so I got a good look, but disappearing into the undergrowth on the other side too quickly to get a picture under night conditions without the flash was a wonderful Western Quoll which I was super happy to see. For some reason, I had the impression that I was supposed to mainly be looking in trees for quolls but it seems they are usually terrestrial. I'm particularly happy with that sighting as my first wild quoll and Western Quolls are quite widespread, not having had to deal with Cane Toads like Northern species, but generally not that often seen. Although the Barna Mia guide did say they could quite often be seen driving home at night.

So spotlighting was good, but a bit chilly. It will definitely drop below freezing at night.

(Written on the day but not posted due to being completely out of phone reception)

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