Thrushton National Park... to Cunnamulla

Got to Thrushton at sunset and set up camp for the night at the old homestead camping ground - not another vertebrate, let alone a human soul, in sight. The evening was cold - very cold for us (< 10 degrees) - and the air damp. Pitched the tent in case it rained, but slept in the swag because it didn't. The skies cleared to bless us with the light of a waxing gibbous moon until the small hours. Didn't here a peep from the critters all night. Took bets on the first bird call, and both of us were proved right: Aussie Raven rustled over us (my guess) just as a Grey butcherbird sung out (Martin's). We rose at first light around 6.30am, registered the Jacky winters, an unidentified raptor, and White-plumed Honeyeater at the camp site, made a coffee to counter the 4 degree factor (🥶), and struck out birding.

Walks and a longer drive revealed a surprising array of birds:
* Thornbills and Weebills were everywhere: it was like a master-class inn thornbill ID, with good looks at mixed flock after mixed flock: Yellow, Inland and Chestnut-rumped thornbills, in the company of Weebills
* White-browed treecreepers were abundant and easy to hear and spot
* Mallee ring necks- 2 pairs
* Splendid fairy-wren
* Hooded robin
* Red-capped Robin (on the way out of the park, south-western edge)
* Striped HE, Singing HE, Brown-headed HE, Spiny-cheeked HE, Brown HE
* Mistletoebird
* Double-barred finches
*White-bellied cuckoo-shrike (H)
* Laughing kookaburra (H)
* Common bronzewing
* Bar-shouldered dove
* Diamond dove (H)
* Varied sitella
* Brown falcon
* Nankeen kestrel
* ? Crested Bellbird (skulked off)
* Australian magpie
* Pied butcherbird (leaving on the southwestern side)

Packed up camp at lunchtime and headed off to Cunnamulla/Eulo. Many emus along the road. En route Marty found us my first ever Bluebonnets! A party of 5 birds feeding in some Mulga trees, next to dozens of Yellow-throated miners. All were alarmed by a roving Peregrine Falcon that swept through low, as we watched. The Bluebonnets were as stunning as I'd imagined with royal blue faces; the birds we saw were the haematogaster subspecies, red lower belly, yellowish vent.Read more