There are no Kangaroos Down Under!?

[Lisbeth]

The koala is absolute adorable I remember that I bought a koala peluche for my younger sister......made of koala fur I was not yet into conservation and there were still plenty of koalas.

They also have mini sized birds

There are some big monsters on the roads

[Duke]

Some familiar birds and some new ones

and a kaola and even a kangaroo

[Bushveld Jock]

Hi Mel,

Just joined you on this tour of cute koala, colourful birds and beautiful coast line. Love those parrots and the sea looks very tempting for a swim, but I suppose the winter weather was slightly cold for a swim.

[melou]

Hi Mel

Despite the grey rainy weather you still got some amazing photos
In particular, the photo of the koala doing something is very rare indeed!

I had to do some homework on egret identification for you, and from what I read and the pictures I looked at, I think your egret is a non-breeding great egret

The main diagnostic feature is the commissural line which is a dark line extending from the base of the bill.
In great egrets the line extends further behind the eye, whereas in intermediate egrets the line only goes as far as the eye.
I zoomed in on your pic and to me it looks as though the commissural line extends further back behind the eye

Check out this webpage:

http://www.graemechapman.com.au/library ... .php?c=710

Also another great Australian bird ID site I use a lot is this one:

http://www.birdsinbackyards.net/species/Ardea-modesta

In Australia it is Father's Day so we are off to Lou's brother's house for a BBQ.
Unfortunately it is raining so we might need to have an indoor BBQ

melou

[nan]

nice links

[Mel]

nan, we were lucky enough not to be behind such a truck ever. Otherwise we would have been stuck. The campervans were way too slow to overtake such long beasts.

Lis, I reckon most people have done something silly like that. And there are quite a few mini-sized birds. I just didn't get many of those.

Duke, I was actually surprised about the amount of familiar birds when I first opened my Oz bird book. But luckily, there are also a lot of new, very colourful species for me.

BJ, thanks for joining! I also thought that the water would be too cold for a swim. But it is actually not. Something around 20 to 24 degrees - even in winter! Amazing.

melou, thanks so much for looking into my birdie! Will amend my post accordingly, because you are right. Both links are a good source for the IDing, but I think that Graeme Chapman is particularly helpful. Used both of them as well. And also this one: http://www.ozanimals.com/australian-bird-index.html
Hope you BBQ wasn't / isn't too wet.

[Mel]

August 8 to 11, 2014 - Alice Springs to Uluru and Kata Tjuta National Park back to Alice Springs

Driving down the Stuart Highway from Alice Springs to the turn off at Erldunda (which is basically nothing more than a petrol station with the possibility of overnighting in various sorts of accommodation) to Lasseter Highway that takes you to the Uluru offers not much variety in landscape. The road is pretty straight and you can almost see who is about to visit the next day.



Occasionally I was reminded of the red dunes in the KTP.



Before reaching the National Park, there is another rock formation / mountain - Mount Connor.

[Mel]

The next morning we got up early to watch the sun rise over Uluru and Kata Tjuta.







I was more fascinated by the changing colour of the sky than the changing colour of Uluru, to be honest...

[Mel]

Kata Tjuta a bit closer:

[Mel]

We went back the same night to watch the sun set over Uluru and found that a much more enjoyable exercise,
since the colours are way more spectacular than in the morning. Plus, we were really lucky that we were there
just a day before full moon.