Birds and Flowers – Australian Botanic Gardens Mt Annan – 25 September 2023

I had suggested a visit to the Botanic Gardens at Mt Annan to Valerie and Sue – as there seemed to be a lot of interesting birds seen there recently and also it was Spring – and so the flowers should be good.

We had a great day.

When we arrived we first visited Lake Nadungamba. We saw a wide range of birds. Here are some –

Australian Reed-Warbler

Baillon’s Crakes

We saw two. The first was harder to photograph as it was skulking in the reeds.

The second Baillon’s Crake was more in the open –

Australasian Grebe

Red-backed Kingfisher

This is a rare bird to see in Sydney. Here it is about to cough up a pellet –

And then I was hoping for a flight.

This is a juvenile Red-capped Robin –

Brown Thornbill

White-winged Triller

Scarlet Honeyeater

We went back for more photos of the Baillon’s Crake –

Golden-headed Cisticola

We then visited the cafe for a coffee. And later found a shady place to have lunch. As we were finishing, another photographer came past and had chat. Misname was Glen and he gave us some good tips on where to see certain plants and birds.

The Daisy Garden was amazing –

We then visited the Waratahs, both white and red –

And I was particularly keen to see the Colo River Tea Tree, Leptospermum spectabile –

Many years ago, I had found this stunning bright red tea tree growing amongst the boulders on the Colo River near Boorai Ridge. I carried out samples of the leaves, fruit, flowers and buds, and then asked a friend who was working at the time at the Herbarium at the Sydney Botanic Gardens to give them to one of the botanists. It was described a few years later.

We then headed to the Stolen Generations section. On the way, I spotted this Satin Bowerbird –

On another earlier visit to the Botanic Gardens this sculpture by indigenous artist Badger Bates had been vandalised, and was covered up. We were glad to see that the artist was able to restore it –