Biological, Earth & Environmental Sciences Centre for Ecosystem Science

Day 11, Broken Hill to Griffith

John Porter profile portrait John Porter
Aerial photo of shearing shed and quarters surrounded by flood waters. The river is running in the background. There ivegetation on the floodplain is green. There are a few dirt roads coming to the buildings.

Date: Tuesday October 18th 2022

Project: Eastern Australian Waterbird Survey

Observers: John Porter & Terry Korn

Pilot: Alex Katopodis

Heavy cloud and rain greeted us the next morning as we fired up the aircraft engine and headed back to Menindee Lakes and Talywalka Creek to complete our surveys.

 

Talywalka Creek meander.

 The NPWS quarters and shearing shed on Kinchega NP were ringed with water – a beautiful sight. 

 

Shearing shed and quarters at Kinchega National Park surrounded by floodwater.

Temporary wetlands Emu Lake and Kangaroo Lake were full, but supported only low numbers of waterbirds.

As expected Lake Tandou was dry and devoid of birdlife - its water supply has been so modified it no longer receives water or functions as a wetland even in a flood year. The last wetland on our schedule, Nettlegoe Lake was dry and we departed Band 4 and set our sights on The Darling Anabranch lakes 75 km to the south.

Lake Nettlegoe, dry, even in a flood year.

The Anabranch Lakes system was near full with the intriguingly named Lakes Popiltah, Popio, and Mindona all filled with water though supporting relatively low numbers of waterbirds. Once these lakes were surveyed we continued south to Mildura before turning east along Survey Band 3.

After a quick refuel in Mildura, we headed off again to survey across sections of the Murray with enormous volumes of water flowing in the channel and parts of the floodplain.

The Lowbidgee wetlands looked stunning with water everywhere, healthy red gum forest and some large breeding colonies of straw necked ibis, spoonbills and pelicans.

 

Healthy looking Lowbidgee floodplain.

 

Yanga Lake, Lowbidgee.

The pelican colony on Kieta Lake, which is a part of the Gayini Wetlands, had around 3,000 nests with most of the birds sitting on eggs.

Survey of Kieta Lake.

Another Gayini wetland, Eulimbah, had a spectacular breeding colony of between 10,000 & 15,000 straw necked ibis in full swing. 

Surveying Eulimbah wetland.

We finished up counting and headed to Griffith as the light began to fade, collecting another big day of counting in the bag.