The fox and the bower

My three trail cameras continue to provide entertainment and insight into the lives of pademelons, wallabies, goannas and even snakes on my property. And occasionally the neighbours’ invading sheep and the odd transient dox and fox.

The fox has been a regular feature since I set up the cameras four months ago. First, it came with its mother, but now appears to be on its own. Foxes may have been here for years but we never knew until we saw the evidence with our own eyes.

One video caught a mother pademelon seeing off the fox, which cringed away, so maybe it’s leaving the pademelons alone. I haven’t seen our bandicoots for years so I fear they may have been taken by this fox or previous ones. There doesn’t seem to be a lessening of pademelon numbers and they are mating (caught on video!) and producing youngsters as usual.

The satin bowerbird’s bower continues to be maintained by him, and a young male bowerbird has taken to visiting and practising arranging the blue bits and even doing practice dances.

The crinum lilies which used to surround the bower have been munched to death by caterpillars so there’s now a clear spot around the bower. Whipbirds, wonga pigeons and even pademelons are visiting the spot but they don’t seem to put off the male bowerbird. I have a video of him staring at a wonga, and one of him with a pademelon.

The fox has also been making the odd appearance around the bower, I guess attracted by the smell of pademelons. But I was astonished by two videos in sequence of the fox – she (I’m guessing a she by her behavoir later in the sequence) went into the bower, rolled in it a few times, then peed and moved off.

I’m not able to put up the video of the fox but here are a few stills.

The fox enters the bower

Rolling inside the bower

Making her mark

But that hasn’t put off the male bowerbird – a couple of days later there are videos of him adding sticks to the bower, rearranging the blue plastic bits and even having a visit by a female bowerbird and displaying to her.

Male satin bowerbird entertaining a lady

I would never have guessed that this sort of thing happened. Hooray for trail cams!

Caterpillars galore!

Munch time! My swamp lilies are being demolished, as they are every year, by Spodoptera picta …

Spodoptera picta on crinum lily

And Andrew found this beauty in the veggie bed while weeding – Chelepteryx chalepteryx, white stemmed wattle moth …

Chelepteryx chalepteryx

The defensive spines on caterpillars can cause skin irritation, so it’s best not to pick them up with bare hands. An old Latin proverb I learned at high school comes to mind: “Nemo me impune lacessit“. Loosely translated, it means: “No one touches me without consequences.”

Fiery skimmers

I do love the common names of Australian dragonflies and damselflies: wisps, riverdamsels, pondsitters, reedlings, rockmasters, duskhawkers … they sound like something out of a fairy tale. (If you are keen, you can see a list here.)

Fiery skimmers (Orthetrum villosovittatum) regularly visit my frog pond. A pair will chase each other around, hover, land on a plant stem, connect, disconnect, and then the female will dip into the surface of the pond and lay her eggs. Then the whole process will repeat for 15 minutes or so.

Steve Wilson of the Queensland Museum told me this:

The dragonflies are Fiery Skimmers, Orthetrum villosovittatum. The male is the individual with the bright red abdomen, and the one the duller orange abdomen is the female. The female would have been laying eggs into the water. In many species the females extrudes eggs from the reproductive opening towards the tip of her abdomen. She then dips the tip of her abdomen into the water and the eggs are deposited into the water and sink to the bottom. In this species the male hovers above the egg-laying female, guarding her from the attentions of rival males that will attempt to mate with her.

I wondered why the male was following me around, and then I realised the shirt I was wearing had the exact same red on it as he did – I wonder if he saw me as another male to chase away.

The male fiery skimmer is red, the female duller

Fiery skimmers mating

Dragonfly larvae develop from the eggs in the water, moulting their skins perhaps 10 times and growing each time, before climbing onto a plant out of the water; then the adults will split out of their larval skins.

Dragonfly nymph; photo by CSIRO, Wikimedia Commons

.The NParks Buzz website talks about the dragonfly life cycle and the formation of the adults from the larvae:

The process is similar to how a butterfly emerges from a caterpillar pupa. As the dragonfly pumps bodily fluids throughout its body, it will expand and the wings will harden. After a few hours, a complete adult dragonfly is formed and ready for flight. Once the adult flies away, all that is left is the empty skin hanging onto the water plant. A keen observer can sometimes spot these empty skins at a pond.

The striped marsh frogs (Limnodynastes peronii) and striped rocket frogs (Litoria nasuta) presently breeding in my frog pond will not be impressed, since dragonfly larvae eat tadpoles as well as water beetles, mosquito larvae, worms and small fish. They have an extendable lower jaw with hooks and sharp teeth; the jaw shoots out rapidly to capture the prey. Remember the creature in the film Alien? (Would rather not, thank you.)

Striped marsh frog – its call is an incessant ‘tok … tok …’

Striped marsh frog, with eggs above it

The frogs might be driving me crazy at night with their loud breeding calls (serves me right for having the pond outside the bedroom) but I do appreciate the wildlife therein.

Cicada-hunters galore!

The cicadas are particularly ear-splitting this season, males madly singing for mates at the same time as providing lots of food for birds and other creatures. (Although I love the word ‘stridulating’, it is not technically correct for the way cicadas produce their sound.) One of these predators is a large orange-and-black wasp, Exeirus lateritius.

Friend Carole wrote this piece for her local bush regeneration group and kindly allowed me to publish it here as well. Thanks, Carole!

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Photo by Carole Helman

When walking in the forest across the road, I encountered the dramatically named ‘Great Australian Cicada-hunter’ wasp, dragging a ‘Green Grocer’ cicada along the ground.  I saw the same thing some years ago, and guessed about the life cycle, that it was probably going to bury the cicada to feed the next generation of wasps. But we’ve only now followed it up, and found it in a very old reference book, ‘Insects of Australia and New Zealand’, which was published in 1926, and was one of Phil’s dad’s entomological reference books.

These beautiful big orange and black wasps hunt large cicadas in the trees, and sting them so they fall senseless to the ground. The wasp then turns the cicada onto its back and drags it to a burrow, which can be a hundred metres along the forest floor, over and under many small and larger obstacles, including logs. [You can see a photo of the burrow here.] The burrows are in a large mound of freshly turned-up clay, pierced by a number of burrows, which lead far down and end in a number of galleries or ‘catacombs’. The wasp hides the paralysed cicadas in these, and lays an egg on each.  When the egg hatches into a larva, the larva eats the cicada and then pupates in an earth cocoon next to the remains of the cicada, until the right conditions occur for it to become an adult wasp and start the cycle again.  It’s always interesting that when we have a big cicada year, we suddenly start noticing lots of these amazing wasps. 

The reason for not being able to get the photo well-focused is that the wasp was on a mission, constantly moving, buzzing furiously as it used its wings to help lift the load and keep up the momentum as it dragged it uphill, and over things.  I thought maybe I could keep following and try to find where it was going to take the wasp, but it kept going so far that after a while I wondered whether it was just dragging the cicada away from me, so I left it in peace.  If there is a next time … having read the book … I’ll follow one, up hill and down through gully, over and under logs!  It’s all very interesting.

We always knew that the cicadas are an important food resource for lots of species of birds, lizards and small mammals, but they are obviously also important for other creatures.  So we will continue to put up with the noisy cicada season, knowing there are lots of biodiversity benefits of it.

Unfortunately, though, the species this cicada-hunter got is NOT one of the noisiest culprits!  Go for the Razor-grinders, I say!

Mounted specimen of Exeirus lateritius – the Australian cicada-killer wasp – at Melbourne Museum; author Canley, Wikimedia Commons

Who goes there? (part 2)

I forgot this bird last time

In the video, this tawny frogmouth was gobbling something small from the ground before flying up and out of view.

Tawny frogmouth

The mammals

The previous post dealt with some birds and reptiles I caught on my trail cameras. This time it’s mammals, most of which I was delighted to see and others not so much.

The night squad

I cannot think that this is anything other than a microbat – we hear them and have seen them. They fly fast and straight and I was lucky to get this on camera.

Microbat?

 

I’ve seen the occasional echidna in the daytime – this one was trundling around over a few nights, possibly attracted by the water.

Echidna

 

 

 

 

 

Grey-headed flying fox hanging upside down in the mulberry tree, feasting on the fruit with its flappy friends (below)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One morning I found this unfortunate juvenile flying fox at the base of the mulberry tree.

Juvenile grey-headed flying fox, deceased

 

Bounding macropods abound …

Red-necked pademelon – they come out at all hours of the day and night at my place, despite being spoken of as crepuscular

Six glowing eyes – red-necked pademelons

Mother pademelon with frisky joey

Male pademelons fighting in the night

I have always called these black possums “mountain brushtail possums” or “bobucks” but that name is now reserved for the southern grouping since the NSW/Qld group has been designated a different species to the Vic group. Our lot are now called “the short-eared possum”. I miss the old name.

“Don’t drop me, Mum!”

“You’re too big to carry now, junior!”

Junior tells an interested male to push off in no uncertain terms.

“Push off, mate!”

The day squad

“Darn those itchy ants!”

Male pademelons fighting in the day

 

Male (left) and female red-necked wallabies

Red-necked wallaby

“Darn those itchy ants!”

“No, you can’t fit in my pouch!”

Not so happy with

A beautiful animal but it does a lot of damage to wildlife … there’s also a kit about.

Fox

Also I caught a video of cat, possibly domestic or possibly feral – the still from the video is too hard to make out so I haven’t put it here although the movement is very clearly that of a cat.

It really is delightful to know what’s out and about when we’re not aware of them, even if it might not be what we expect.

Who goes there? (part 1)

As I mentioned in the previous post, I’d done some animal monitoring workshops and was keen to see what might be at my place that I hadn’t seen before. I’ve taken quite a few photos of birds, reptiles, frogs, insects, spiders – the usual stuff – but the possibility of videos, especially at night, intrigued me. What was lurking in the dead of night that I didn’t know about? What sort of behaviour would I capture?

So when Mark from the Border Ranges Richmond Valley Landcare Network offered to lend me a trail camera, I didn’t resist. Several years ago I’d copy-edited a book for CSIRO on motion-detecting camera use (“Camera Trapping: Wildlife Management and Research“) so I had a bit of an idea what to expect. Although the book would be out of date by now, it still has lots of useful information.

Commercial trail cameras are generally optimised for detecting large game animals, e.g. deer or pigs. Or, according to my local hunting store who sold me two, diesel thieves on farms – a different world!

Triggers on trail cameras use sensors that track thermal radiation from an animal’s body so may fail to trigger on small animals or may not trigger quickly enough for animals that move through the frame at speed, like birds. Videos get triggered by vegetation moving in the wind, too, even if there are no critters. But the positive results from the community above me on the mountain were encouraging, so I took Mark’s Browning camera and advice on where and how to set it up. After I took it back, and a bit of research, I bought tthree Bushnells to continue the fun – it’s addictive!

Here are some of the stills taken from the videos. Identifications are in the captions.

Birds

Bar-shouldered dove

Blue-faced honeyeater (left) and Australian magpie

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Don’t interrupt my sunbathing!”

Australian magpies

Satin bowerbird male adjusting his display near the bower

Female bowerbird inspecting the bower

the

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I also captured a video of what seemed to be a juvenile male satin bowerbird (difficult to distinguish from the female up to about 7 years of age, when males have turned black) sneaking around and poking at sticks in the bower. I’d read that adult males steal from each other’s bowers, so I guess the young ones are practising for when they grow up.

Male brush turkey – note the big yellow wattle, compared to the smaller wattle on the female or juvenile below

Brush turkey (female or juvenile)

Noisy miner

Scaly-breasted lorikeets

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Both these pigeons are rainforest inhabitants.

Wonga pigeons

White-headed pigeon

Reptiles

I discovered at least three lace monitors, one of which had lost part of its tail.

Big lace monitor, sans part of tail

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two lace monitors, smaller than Mr Stumpy but with normal tail lengths

Lace monitor

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next time

The next post will cover mammals and things that go bump in the night (often the same thing).

‘Tis the season …

… to do workshops – wildlife workshops, that is. Local Landcare groups have been hosting them and this spring I went to three.

The first was a “Science in the Pub” event at Kyogle: “Sounds of the Bush”.

Dr David Newell  from Southern Ctross University (Lismore) is working on endangered frogs and the son of one of my neighbours is doing a PhD with him.

I was thrilled to learn from Jane Baldwin that there are Albert’s lyrebirds (Menura alberti, a near threatened species) up the mountain behind where I live.

The Albert’s lyrebird is one of only two species of Australian lyrebird  (the other is the superb) and has a very restricted range. Wikipedia says:

In New South Wales it is found only in the far north of the Northern Rivers region, along the Border Ranges and in Nightcap National Park in the east, possibly as far west as Koreelah National Park. A large concentration is found in the Mount Warning area. Isolated populations may still exist in remnant rainforest patches as far south as Wardell.

Now we can add Mackellar Range, with a female and chick spotted on trail camera footage.

Peter Knock and Mark Ambrose spoke about audiomonitoring for the presence of owls and koalas. I already get an audiomonitor for koalas for a couple of weeks every spring for a Department of Primary Industries project on koalas on private land – this year they sent me a microbat audiomonitor as well. I’ve caught a microbat on trail cam (more on my trail cam photos in the next post) and have heard the greater sooty owl (Tyto tenebricosa) occasionally at night – it has a very distinctive call, described as being like a falling bomb.

The second workshop was at the office of the Border Ranges – Richmond Valley Landcare Network in Kyogle. Mark Ambrose again spoke about audiomonitoring of koalas, just for evidence of presence. He handed out audiomonitors to those interested and ran through the use of the software that produces sonograms to identify koala (and other) sounds. AI ID hasn’t been developed for this yet so it still has to be done manually by scrolling through the sonograms, but he pointed out shortcuts – the koala’s sonogram looks very distinctive so you don’t have to listen to very one of hundreds of sonograms once you recognise the pattern visually. By this stage I already had my DPI monitors so I didn’t borrow one of Mark’s. But I did borrow one of his trail cameras – more on that in the next post.

The third workshop was held conveniently up the mountain on Mackellar Range Trust community, arranged by Mackellar Range Landcare.

Glossy black cockatoos have been seen and photographed up there, and I saw three fly overhead here in the valley. Their cries are distinctive so there’s no confusing them with the yellow-tailed black cockatoos that are common here.

My trail cam unfortunately has detected a fox, so I may be calling on the services of Craig from Reconeco, who talked about possibilities for removing pest species. I already have a cat trap but a fox is out of my league.

Lastly, Mark talked about the importance of tree hollows and using nest boxes to provide shelter and breeding spots for many birds, possums and other animals, since most of the trees around the place are less than 50 years old (due to forest destruction after colonial invasion) and hollows take about 100 years to develop. His advice: make them yourself or buy commercial models, just stick ’em up and don’t be too fussy about what goes into them. It may not be what you expect – the size for rosellas is used by other things than rosellas.

All worthwhile workshops for information, networking and inspiration.

All aflutter

There’s a lot of “mobbing” going on – noisy miners mobbing the local goanna as well as other birds, kookaburra tribes mobbing each other or snakes, and everything mobbing wedge-tailed eagles high in the sky. Well, it’s spring and nests need defending.

We have a couple of Torresian crows (Corvus orru) nesting in our big hoop pine. They seem to come back every year and are very chatty to each other whether they are together or apart.

A couple of days ago we heard them anxiously cawing, as well as the loud wing flaps as they zoomed back and forth. We dashed outside and saw them flanking a large bird that looked very much like a white version of themselves. They shepherded this bird for a few minutes, calling loudly all the while, and the three flew off over the paddock after a while.

I googled “white crow”, thinking it might be an albino, and came across this article from 2015: “WIRES says rare white crow has high chance of survival”

Apparently WIRES (one of the local wildlife caring organisations) was treating an underweight white crow that couldn’t fly:

At first the crow was thought to be albino, but due to some coloration on his beak and feathers it was later found that he was leucistic.

[A WIRES spokesperson] said leucism is a form of partial albinism.

‘They are very, very rare,’ she said.

‘We’ve never actually seen an albino or a white crow before and probably only once every few years would we see an albino anything.

‘It is a very rare event so we’re all quite excited about him.’

The local newspaper, The Echo, similarly reported:

[A WIRES spokesperson] said the young crow was actually ‘leucistic’ … that is, with blue eyes, pink beak and feathers that are not completely white.

‘True albinism is caused by a complete lack of melanin, the naturally occurring pigment that gives colour to the skin, feathers, hair and eyes,’ she said.

‘Vertebrates with albinism are not only white (or sometimes pale yellowish) in colour but they also have very pale eyes, often pink or red in colour as the blood vessels show through.

‘Leucism, on the other hand, is a partial loss of pigmentation, which can make the animal have white or patchily coloured skin, hair, feathers and so on, but the pigment cells in the eyes are not affected by the condition.

‘In this case, our white crow’s eyes are blue. Few albino or leucistic animals survive into adulthood in the wild, most often due to eyesight problems or harassment by other birds.’

The articles each have a photo but in case you don’t want to click on the links, this photo of a leucistic carrion crow (Corvus corone, an European crow) will give you an idea of the colouring.

Leucistic carrion crow (photo by Kanohara, Wikimedia Commons)

I like to think that it’s the same crow, seven years older and hale and hearty. WIRES weren’t the only ones to be excited.

While I’m on the topic of crows, ours keep bringing food to wash in our big birdbath – slices of bread, bits of chicken, even pasta, presumably sourced from one of the neighbours’ compost heaps.

I think our crows have also learned how to safely eat cane toads. Many other birds have learned to avoid the poison sacs on the toads’ backs by flipping them over and attacking the belly. We found this corpse on the ground near the crow’s tree.

Eviscerated cane toad

They even washed the internal bits in the birdbath.

Crows 1, cane toads 0.

Pigface – native and non-native hybridisation

Yesterday on Sharpes Beach, Ballina, I had one of the more interesting conversations I’ve had with a random stranger. Peter Hardwick, according to his Linkedin page ‘wild food researcher, consultant, regenerative forager, native food research, feral food, zero input food, food ingredient invention, bushfood regeneration’, was photographing native pigface. I’d read about the hybridisation threat with introduced pigface and it was nice to meet the originator of that information. I’d never tasted the native pigface fruit before – sweet and salty at the same time.

Peter’s Facebook post (reproduced with permission)

The non-native Carpobrotus aequilaterus, angled pigface on the left with red stems and dark leaves, whereas the native pigface, Carpobrotus glaucescens, with the lighter coloured leaves is on the right.

Non-native pigface (left) compared with native (right) (photo by Peter Hardwick)

There’s a serious risk to the native pigface throughout Australia from hybridisation with the non-native pigface that have escaped from peoples gardens and from council plantings.

It so important to only plant the local native pigface from locally sourced stock.

Native pigface, Carpobrotus, are one of the best coastal bushfoods in Australia. But unfortunately, there’s an unseen threat to the survival of native pigface that comes from peoples’ gardens – introduced ornamental pigface are escaping and hybridising with the native pigface.

The problem of introduced non-native pigface going wild is widespread. In some places in South Australia researchers found that half of the Carpobrotus in the wild were hybrids with the non-native pigface. Hybrid pigface can also be vigorous and overwhelm the native pigface in their habitat.

Ultimately this could drive local native pigface into a kind of hybrid extinction. It also represents a loss of culture – pigface fruit is an important traditional food.

In Bundjalung country the pigface has a superb flavour – somewhat like salty kiwifruit. It would be a tragedy to lose that wonderful flavour profile and cultural feature from hybridisation with introduced pigface.

There needs to be an active campaign to save pigface and encourage people to only plant the local native variants. Some regeneration style native nurseries make a point of keeping the local pigface in stock. But also be careful of mislabelled plants.

One of the most popular cultivated pigface varieties which is labelled as native Carpobrotus glaucescens, but based on a number of features including the purple colour of the petaloid staminoides going right down to the base, it looks more like non-native C. aequilateris.

Non-native pigface are also easy to remove, but just make sure it’s identified correctly before removal, and replace with cuttings of the local native pigface. Pigface are very important sand dune stabilisers too.

It can get complex identifying what’s native and what’s non-native in some locations in Vic, SA, Tas, WA and NSW because there can be multiple native species of the pigface family in the same location. Good to get know the local native pigface species before removing anything.

Identifying and removing hybrids is going to be difficult because they have a mixture of native and non-native features. But there’s the hope that we will be able to tune in to the species so as we can work out what to remove and what to keep.

Peter’s later answers to questions in comments on his FB post

• If you have white at the base of the petals it’s probably fine. Pale pink, but not white, at the base of the petals it’s most likely non-native. Red stems can occur on non-native and native, but some non-native Carpobrotus have very distinctive deep burgundy red stems.

• You can eat the pulp of the fruit raw, but discard the astringent skin. The leaves can also be eaten, but my experience is that the leaves are usually too astringent to be eaten raw. I cook them in simmering water with a change of water.

• Here’s a pic of Carpobrotus glaucescens, the main native east coast species. See the white base of the ‘petals’. Also, the native bee working the flower. Both native and introduced bees are major pollinators and will aid in pollen dispersal between plants.

Both native bees (like this one) and introduced bees are important pollinators. (Photo by Peter Hardwick)

• This is non-native Carpobrotus aequilaterus, angled pigface. See how it’s consistently pink coloured all the way to the ‘petal’ base. This plant is growing very vigorously in a council park at Lennox Head.

Non-native Carpobrotus aequilaterus, angled pigface (photo by Peter Hardwick)

• Sometimes I find the non-native pigface don’t develop fruit because they are hybrids. Also, I find that the non-natives are generally not as flavoursome.

Further reading

– Carpobrotus in Australia:

http://bio.mq.edu.au/…/Plant–of–the–week–Carpobrotus…

– Carpobrotus hybridisation in SA:

https://data.environment.sa.gov.au/…/CarpobrotusBrochur…

– Carpobrotus hybridisation in WA:

https://library.dbca.wa.gov.au/…/FullTextF…/C20329.a.pdf

The Top End (part 14)

Day 10 – The Tiwi Islands

I normally like a nice 80 km boat trip to an island, but declined once again for health reasons.

Our information blurb said (among other things):

The Tiwi Islanders are culturally and linguistically distinct from mainland First Nations people. …

 

The Tiwi people have lived on their land for more than 40,000 years. It is believed that they conducted trade with Macassan merchants who sailed from South Sulawesi from the early 1700s until the early 1900s, and who interacted with First Australians on the mainland. They brought with them seed of tamarind trees (Tamarindus indicus), which have since naturalised.

From Kath

Day 10 of ‘The Top End’ trip was a day to remember. It was also the last day of our planned tour. We headed to the Tiwi Islands to meet with the Islanders, experience their culture through song and dance, and to literally get a hands-on art workshop experience with the very experienced artists of Tiwi Design.

We took 2.5 hours in a high-speed catamaran to cross the Beagle Gulf separating Darwin from the Tiwi (two) Islands, Bathurst and Melville. Unfortunately, some of our group suffered sea-sickness, due to being confined indoors. Those of us who ventured outside on the very windy deck fared better. There was a large group of over-55ers on board, and I met a few of them and we shared stories on the trip, there and back.

After arriving at the Wurrumiyanga Dock on the smaller Bathurst Island, we were met by our very knowledgeable and articulate Islander guides, who ensured we were safely herded around the island for the duration of our stay.

Vivian, the guide, explains the layout of the islands (photo by Bruce Moore)

We were given a formal welcome to country and cleansing smoking ceremony, before enjoying an interpretation of songs and dances (signifying local totems), performed by a large group of the Islanders. I found this experience both fascinating and heart-warming.

Setting up the fire for the smoking ceremony (photo by Bruce Moore)

Greeting dance (photo by Bruce Moore)

We were promised damper and we got it! Yum! Then it was our turn to try our hands at making our own silkscreen art. Gently guided by the experienced artists who work in the open air workshop of the famous Tiwi Design workshop and gallery, we all produced amazing works of art!

Getting set up for silk screening (photo by Bruce Moore)

Vivian guides the process (photo by Bruce Moore)

Jerry is happy with his result (photo by Bruce Moore)

Thuan created a crocodile shirt (photo by Bruce Moore)

Bruce’s crab (photo by Bruce Moore)

Joy says: I regretted not attending the workshop, but Linda very kindly made me a tea towel with a turtle – one of my favourite animals. (How did she know? At some stage I must have told her.) What a nice surprise, thanks, Linda!

Turtle tea towel; artist Linda Yamada (photo by Bruce Moore))

Back to Kath: We put them out to dry in the hot sun, and were led off to lunch – which was a five-star take-away lunch box! Next, we were taken on a short tour of the local island attractions: Tiwi Design gallery … 

Tiwi Design shop front (photo by Kathy Pearce)

Some of the pieces in the Tiwi Design gallery (photo by Kathy Pearce)

Some larger works (photo by Bruce Moore)

… the Patakijiyali Museum …

Information at the museum on Tiwi seasons, plants and animals (photo by Kathy Pearce)

Front of museum (photo by Kathy Pearce)

Photo by Kathy Pearce

and the Mission church …

Bathurst Island church interior (photo by Bruce Moore)

Photo by Bruce Moore

As with most return trips, the 2.5 hours went faster on the way back because we knew what to expect. We arrived back at Cullen Bay Marina, Darwin, pretty exhausted, but full of memories of this amazing day with the Tiwi.

Back to Joy

While the others were cavorting and creating art, I rested a bit more, then walked to Parliament House – I thought I’d spend some time at the state library there.

After passing a security check, I had a coffee at the café (my taste and smell were finally coming back after I so carelessly lost them on the first day of the trip) while waiting for the library to open. Naturally there was a great deal of material on places we had been and the history of the Territory to pore over, and that kept me occupied for a few hours.

I appreciated the quiet time to contemplate where I’d been and appreciate that I’d seen so much. I’m pleased to report that my health returned to normal soon after I got home.

Day 11 – Home

I spent the last morning chatting with Kath as it was the last time I would be seeing her for a while. Then we all piled onto the bus for the trip to the airport and home.

Moi getting into the research straight away (photo by Bruce Moore)

I was struck by this passage from Steve Morton, Australian Deserts: Ecology and Landscapes (2022, CSIRO Publishing, p. 243):

Australian desert country can be tough indeed, yet it reveals softer sides of itself in unpredictable moments of transcendence. It is not a chocolate-box beauty available on demand, but a rare offering to those with patience, and made more expressive and affecting because of vivid contrast with the usual austerity of the landscape. Being open to such moments can be a beginning for anyone who chooses to experience the Outback with unhurried appreciation. In all their immensity, and in their smallest details of natural history, the deserts await your exploration.