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Lyrebird Tales Lyrebird Tales Volume 25 Number 4 December 2016 Christmas in August (and Cocos in September) By Doug Pocock The advertisement for Christmas Island Bird ‘n’ Nature Week in Birdlife caught our eye. Here was a chance to go somewhere we had heard of so often and have someone else do all the organizing! After a long day’s travelling we arrived at Christmas Island and were taken to our very comfortable accommodation. That evening over dinner we were given an outline of the week ahead. Golden Bosunbird on a tree hollow Photo © D. Pocock Lunch was served in a nearby park where we were able to look down from a cliff-top lookout upon the Golden Bosunbirds wheeling around on courting flights. The lookout was directly above a Red-footed Booby nesting tree which was also used by Frigatebirds. The park was surrounded by bushy areas where we saw the C.I White-eye and the C.I Glossy Swiftlet. In the afternoon we banded more Red-tailed Tropicbirds and saw some breeding Common Noddies. The hotel swimming pool was just outside our door and was most welcome each day though it was rather warm. That evening the pattern was set for an evening talk by one of our leaders Red-tailed Tropicbird Photo © Doug Pocock followed by a delightful dinner. The first morning was a little chaotic but after sorting out our groups and vehicles we headed off under our leader Nic’s direction to a nearby Red-tailed Tropicbird rookery. Here Nic gave us an outline of his (voluntary) program into these birds Contents along with the local Golden Bosunbird (C.I. form of White- 1-3. Christmas in August (Cocos in September) tailed Tropicbird) and Common Noddies. Then we plunged into the rocky, scrubby area where we soon found our first by Doug Pocock ground nesting Tropicbird. Nic banded the adult bird which he 4. Platypus and Australasian Grebe. had caught easily and went on to catch and band several Ancient wing found in Burmese amber. young fledglings. Typical of birds which developed on uninhabited islands they had little fear of humans. The main 5.Committee. What bird is that? Breeding records 2016 threat to the chicks was from cats introduced to the island 6. Interesting sightings. Forthcoming trip to Mud Island and also poor seasons. All the seabirds are suffering to some degree as the ocean waters warm up and have less food. 7.-11 Reports of Meetings and Outings After banding half a dozen birds we went to the main beach 11. Birds are not the only fauna that use this feeder on the island and Nic showed us a C.I. Golden Bosunbird 12. Calendar of Events nesting in a hollow in a tree in the picnic area. Different to the Red-tails these nest in hollows in trees or natural hollows in the cliffs. Lyrebird Tales difficult for the turtles which dig their nesting burrows there. We took out a sackful of rubbish but that had a depressingly small effect on the overall quantity. That night the evening meal was prepared by the hospitality pupils at the high school. We sat outside at our tables but after a short while we became aware of dozens of large Robber Crabs, attracted by the smell of food, advancing on us like a Hitchcock movie. It made an interesting conversation point. On the third day we were offered a couple of choices. We elected to go with Tim Low on the more difficult option. This walk was to a Ramsar site where some rather unusual mangroves grow. These had been growing coastally but as the land rose it was no longer inundated by the tides. However there is a freshwater creek to keep things wet and the mangrove colony has survived for 120,000 years. Unusually for mangroves some of these are large trees 30-40 Brown Booby and chick Photo © Doug Pocock metres tall. There were C.I. Flying Foxes seen hanging in fig trees. In the afternoon we visited the National Park centre Next day’s leader was Tim Low, author of “Where Song where there is a breeding program for an endangered gecko Began”. Tim is a “big picture” man and talked about the and the Blue-tailed Skink which is extinct in the wild. greater environmental picture. We drove along some narrow tracks where we soon became aware of the famous C.I. Red Crabs. These crabs clean the forest floor, removing leaves and fallen litter leaving open forest. Frighteningly, small “Crazy Ants” have invaded the island and in places have formed vast colonies. Though small, these ants can kill red crabs by blinding them with formic acid spray and getting under their carapace to slowly eat them. Where the crabs have disappeared the forest floor becomes overgrown and it is not known what effect this may have on the ecosystem. Tim took us to “The Dales”, a series of fresh water streams issuing from the limestone overlaying the basalt which formed the island. In these moist areas lived another endemic crab, the Blue Crab. Along the way, we saw the largest land crab, the Robber Crab. There is an amazing 180 species of crab on and around the island with about 20 being purely land crabs. Christmas Island Goshawk Photo © Doug Pocock Day the fourth saw us out with leader Mark who has many interests including the C.I. Goshawk. Mark has a program of banding to try to get a good estimation of population and greater knowledge of its behaviour. In order to catch the Robber Crab Photo © Doug Pocock birds mark has a ”rat” (actually a flotsam teddy bear’s leg with tail attached!) which is dragged by a long string pulled In the afternoon we visited Greta Beach. This is a delightful along by three people in the back of a ute slowly driving small cove accessed by a large steel ladder, one of the few along the roads and tracks. Another car follows with beaches breaking the forbidding razor sharp limestone cliffs. observers. At the sight of the “rat” a goshawk will swoop and Unfortunately, ocean eddies make this a wash-up point for sometimes grasp the bait. The observers take note of where flotsam, mainly plastic. Thongs, bottles, ropes, disposable the bird is and Mark uses his specially designed “clothes peg lighters and suchlike piles up on the beach making life 2 Lyrebird Tales Lyrebird Tales on a fishing line” to catch the bird by the leg and then band Island, the ferry only costing $1 being heavily subsidized by it. The birds do not seem overly concerned by the handling the Federal Government. Snorkeling was easy accessible as they only fly a short way off and look to see if there is any from the sandy beach and we had some pleasant walks. chance of another false rat to check out. However we kept a wary eye on the coconut palms in case of falling fruit. After four pleasant days on Cocos we boarded Our fifth day was spent with Janos, a German professor the plane for the long trip home. specializing in sea birds, especially C.I. Frigatebirds and Abbott’s Booby. He took us to nesting and roosting sites It had been a very interesting and informative trip onto these where he works but as it was a poor season there were very distant Australian territories. few young birds to band. He also attaches tracking devices which give him distribution patterns for feeding and dispersal. Abbott’s Booby is the largest of the boobies and it nests in large forest trees so that the birds can take off more easily than from the ground. This presents conservation problems as phosphate mining has cleared much old growth forest and the cyclone which hit the island a few years ago blew over many more nesting trees. A current threat is that the phosphate mine wants to expand by cutting down more old growth forest. The C.I. Frigatebird has problems as its flight path takes it to Indonesia where they can get caught in fishing lines and Janos has a photo of shot frigatebirds on sale in a food market. Janos, who is based at Hamburg University, gets minimum Christmas Island Crab Photo © Doug Pocock assistance from the Australian government, most of his funds coming from donations or from overseas sources. Indeed, up to recently he and his students could stay free at the National Park staff house but now they have to pay. We were rather shocked to find that all the programs that we were shown were funded by the people themselves by whatever funds they could get. Some of the costs of our trip went to funding these programs. That night we had dinner at the Golf Club and afterwards went spotlighting and saw the C.I. Hawk-owl. On the last day we had organized a car so we did some snorkeling and then went for a walk to Andersons Dale on the west coast. This is an interesting creek that has cut its way down through the limestone to form a gloomy chasm that leads to the sea. At the mouth of the chasm is a rock pool but there was too much swell to allow swimming. We returned via Margaret Knoll, a nicely elevated lookout with Christmas Island coastline Photo © Doug Pocock spectacular coastal views. We looked down on Brown and Red-footed as well as Abbott’s Boobies, C.I. and Greater Frigatebirds, C.I.Imperial Pigeons and, unusually for daytime, flying foxes.
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