Herdsman Lake, etc.

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After breakfast, we headed out for a day of birding to possibly central Perth’s best and most famous birding site, Herdsman Lake. This promised to be a very good day of birding… but the weather disagreed. It was raining in the morning and continued raining as we drove to Herdsman lake. When we got there it was still raining so we parked near the visitor centre and ran in to look around. There were several live animal exhibits here and various displays about wildlife, introduced species, etc. The live animals held were King’s Skink, Motorbike Frog, Splendid Tree Frog, Oblong Turtle, Western Bluetongue, and a tank with introduced fish species. Now the thing I’m wondering about – is this a zoo?

Also in the visitor centre on an upstairs floor was a bird hide looking out over part of the lake and over the extensive reed beds behind. There were a few waterfowl here that I had seen at Tomato Lake yesterday including Australian Shoveler and Pink-eared Duck however the highlight from here were two Marsh Harriers flying above and occasionally diving down into the reeds. After not too long the rain reduced to a drizzle which then stopped and we decided to brave the weather and go around the lake. There was lots of waterfowl, most of which was quite common stuff, though there were a few Glossy Ibis poking in the mud banks as well as Great White Egrets, and, surprisingly, the first Australian Pelican of the trip. Yes, pelican, there was only one! Usually there are loads around! There were, however, ridiculous numbers of coots!


Other stuff seen included a variety of birds of prey and both Australasian Reed Warbler and Little Grassbird, neither showing particularly well, but were nice to see. The other bird that I saw a lot of that is worthy of note were the introduced Laughing Doves which are quite common in central Perth along with the also introduced Rainbow Lorikeet. Neither of those seem to have made it much out away from Perth though, unlike the also introduced Laughing Kookaburra, which is everywhere in the bush.

As we continued to walk, dark clouds began to gather overhead and soon it started to rain. The rain got heavier, and heavier, and even in a large raincoat I was getting wet. We were quite far from the Visitor Centre by now on the track around the lake, so we had to find some shelter somewhere in the rather open environment of a lake surrounded by reed beds. We got a bit of shelter under some low trees – paperbarks if I remember correctly – which was a bit of relief though it seemed like the rain was just being blown at us sideways with the wind while big droplets fell onto us from above. The heavy rain couldn’t last though, and it didn’t, and after a little while and a lot of wet the rain died down and stopped and the sun came out. We were around a third of the way around the lake so we had to decide whether to go back the way we came or hope that was the end of the rain and do the rest of the route around. The sky seemed to be getting blue so we decided to risk it and do the whole loop which turned out to be the right decision – that was the end of the rain for the day but definitely not the end of the birding because it seemed that all the birds started to come out and we had the lake completely to ourselves.

We continued going around the lake and as I was walking along I saw something dart into the reed beds along the ground. After a few seconds though it started to come back out – a Buff-banded Rail!

We stayed quiet and it showed very nicely even coming out into the open just on the edge of the reed beds before disappearing again a couple of minutes later.

Lots more views of the same birds continued, however two more new birds were seen, first was a Spotted Harrier flying overhead and then back towards the visitor centre again was a large group of Straw-necked Ibis.


We then left Herdsman Lake and had lunch and because there was still time in the day, we went for a walk along a bit of parklands by the Swan River. There wasn’t a huge amount of unusual stuff at first, a brief bit of excitement at a mammal in the bushes turned out to just be a brown rat. I also rather funnily saw another Buff-banded Rail, though this wasn't showing nearly as well. I hoped to see a Black-faced Cuckooshrike which in past experience is very common but I just didn’t find one. Also around were lots of darters,

which are pretty cool, and I could hear loads of frogs including motorbike frogs and I did manage to see one, but it was a tiny, all brown frog hopping into the water so I couldn’t identify it. After a little while we turned around to head back, and on the way back had three notable sightings, the first was a male Musk Duck with throat sack out,

and the second was a family of variegated wrens, though quite hidden in the undergrowth. I also saw a few introduced Long-billed Corellas flying over which I was able to definitely identify, though it can often be quite difficult IDing them in Perth where Long-billed, Little, and Western occur and I have seen all three around in the same areas.

After dinner that evening and after dark, we went for one final area to look for wildlife that day, King’s Park, which is very near to where I stayed. According to the book ‘Finding the Mammals of Australia’ Honey, Ringtail, and Brushtail Possums occur in King’s Park and I particularly wanted to find the former. We walked around for a while and didn’t see anything apart from spiders, we also went to a native flower garden in the hope that that would entice a Honey Possum out, and the finding mammals book suggested staking out a flowering plant but that was also unsuccessful. I did see two Honey Possums, but unfortunately these were both in mosaics in a seating area! A little while later I heard some rustling in the undergrowth and saw something unidentifiable. I suspect this was another bandicoot like I had seen yesterday in the day, but I couldn’t be sure.

Back in the car, we started to head back, and while we were driving along a road still within King’s Park my aunt who was sitting in the front seat called out that there was a barn owl on one of the reflectors on the side of the road. So I jumped out of the car (after waiting for it to stop) and ran back to see if I could find the owl. I saw it in silhouette in a tree by the road and I saw it on one branch then fly down to a nearby branch, and the disappear off. From its size, shape, and posture I was able to determine that it had to be a Masked Owl. So the spotlighting was a success after all.

New birds seen:
Swamp Harrier
Australasian Reed Warbler
White-backed Swallow
Little Grassbird
Glossy Ibis
Eastern Great Egret
Brown Goshawk
Australian Pelican
Buff-banded
Spotted Harrier
Straw-necked Ibis
Variegated Wren
Long-billed Corella
Masked Owl

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