Biological, Earth & Environmental Sciences Centre for Ecosystem Science

Day 12, Griffith to Sydney

John Porter profile portrait John Porter
Aerial photo of lake flooding across the floodplain and inundating a healthy stand of redgum trees. There is a mining operation in the background very close to the floodwater

Date: Wednesday October 19th 2022

Project: Eastern Australian Waterbird Survey

Observers: John Porter & Terry Korn

Pilot: Alex Katopodis

We departed Griffith with the ever present cloud cover keeping things interesting, to head westward and complete our surveys between Hay and Griffith – these were mostly irrigation storages with very few waterbirds present. 

Continuing eastwards we counted the Ramsar wetlands of Tuckerbill and Fivebough Swamps. As usual the waterbirds were abundant and diverse on Fivebough with Purple swamphens and Black swan breeding in progress. 
Aerial photo of inland wetland that has vegetation at surface.

Fivebough Swamp.

We stopped to refuel at Temora before heading north towards the Lachlan river and Lake Cowal.

As we approached Lake Cowal we could see the sheets of water covering much of the landscape, the Lake looked to be about 150% full.

 

Lake Cowal and adjacent floodwaters.

Waterbirds were making good use of the available habitat with good numbers of Grey teal, Wood duck, Black duck and Pink eared duck. Black swans were nesting in several areas and there were plenty of egrets, spoonbills, cormorants and herons. There was an impressive Straw necked ibis colony of about 8,000 - 10,000 pairs with numerous Royal spoonbill and Night herons also nesting.

 

Lake Cowal lined with red gums on its margins.
Aerial photo of inundated floodplain that has redgum trees also being inundated. The water is brown, The sky is blue.

Lake Cowal with the Evolution Cowal mining operation in the background close to floodwaters

From Lake Cowal we returned south to Survey Band 3 and continued eastwards from Harden to Mittagong. This section of the survey contained mainly small dams and reservoirs with relatively few waterbirds encountered.

From Mittagong we headed back to Bankstown to prepare for the next leg of the survey.