Christmas in Australia

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ksuglennj
Posts: 193
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Location: Monticello,AR
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Christmas in Australia

Post by ksuglennj »

As I was typing this I was remembering an old lame Kansas motto, The Land of Ahhhhhhhs. I think I have now gone to the real OZ and not the museum in Wamego, KS. Over the past Christmas I decided to visit one of our forum members who recently moved to Australia, Van (VanAR). I can't lie, I love to go to warm places during the winter and Australia did not disappoint. Had a great time. Van and the rest of you are lucky to be down there. I'm not going to give a ton of story but we herped and enjoyed Sydney. I also did a little birding too. These pics were taken with a smattering of cameras. Mostly my D300 and Olympus Stylus Tuff, but few iPhone pics too.

giant burrowing frog
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Burrowing frog by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

common eastern froglets
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Frog 1 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Frog 2 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

coppertailed skink
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Coppertailed skink 2 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

litter skink
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Litter Skink by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

water skink
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Water Skink by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Water Skink B by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Here skinky by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

Cunningham's skink
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cunningham's skink02 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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cunningham's skink03 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

common scalyfoot
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Scalyfoot02 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Scalyfoot eye by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

Eastern Stone Gecko
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Gecko A01 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

Thick-tailed Gecko
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Gecko B02 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

water dragon
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Water Dragon02 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

redbelly black
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Redbelly blacksnake03 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Redbelly blacksnake05 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

bandy bandy
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Bandy bandy06 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Bandy bandy10 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Bandy bandy02 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
Doing West Texas impression
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Bandy bandy on cut by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

Blackish Blind Snake
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Blind Snake by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Blind Snake2 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

BIRDS

Ibis
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Ibis by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

laughing kookaburra
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Kookaburra by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

magpie
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Magpie by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

variegated ferrywren
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Variegated Ferrywren04 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Variegated Ferrywren female by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

masked lapwing
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Masked Lapwing by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

wood duck
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Wood Duck01 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Wood duck by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

Australasian grebe
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Australasian grebe by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

black duck
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Black Duck (1) by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

crested pigeon
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Crested pigeon by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

noisy miner
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Myna by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

darter
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Darter01 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

great cormorant
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Great Corm02 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

pied cormorant
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Pied Corm A01 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Pied Corm03 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

new holland honeyeater
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Honeyeater by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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New Holland Honeyeater02 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

sulfur crested cockatoo
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sulfur cresed cockatoo by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

rainbow lorikeet
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Rainbow Lorikeet by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

common bronzewing
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Common Bronzewing02 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

rock warbler
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Bird01B by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

brown thornbill
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Bird01 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

MISC CRITTERS

possom
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Possom by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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Wallaby B01 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

Varied Swordgrass Brown
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butterfly by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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Comb by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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Crab by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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fishing spider by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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snail 3 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

black prince cicada
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Cicada by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

flat rock spider
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Flat Rock Spider by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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Flower B01 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

We did a snorkeling trip. It may have been our best day of the two weeks I was there. The pics aren't great but here are a few favorites. The water was fairly rough causing the water to be very cloudy. Feel free to ID.

I did get to swim with the Vanatee (inside joke for the AR crew)
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Van03 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

The urchins were huge
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Urchin by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

schooling squid
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Squid by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

ray species
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Ray2 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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fish40 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Fish38 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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fish31 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Fish25 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Fish19 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Fish18 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Fish11 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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Fish10 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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fish01 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr
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fish24 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

SCENERY

Uni
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Uni Sydney 3 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

View from the Uni
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Uni Sydney 2 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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Scenery02 by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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pic by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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Van in Bush by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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City by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

For Brad (aka mulebrother)
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Road by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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Van by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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Burned out car by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

I was able to afford this trip by sleeping at the foot of Van's bed in his one bedroom flat.
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Our Christmas tree that Van's mom sent him
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And our Christmas dinner, roo
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This is where Van and I spent our last night on the town. I'm a bit of a beer snob and this place by far had the best beer I drank in Sydney
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Lord Nelson Brewery by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

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Harbor by Herp Photographer, on Flickr

I'm ready to go back and thanks for looking. Glenn
gretzkyrh4
Posts: 661
Joined: June 7th, 2010, 12:17 pm
Location: Baton Rouge, LA

Re: Christmas in Australia

Post by gretzkyrh4 »

Looks like you guys had a great trip. Wish Melina and I had the time/money to make it down there and visit Van for a bit. Thanks for sharing.

Chris
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moloch
Posts: 561
Joined: June 16th, 2010, 1:26 pm

Re: Christmas in Australia

Post by moloch »

Glenn,

Looks like you had a great trip! I love Royal NP and try to go there a few times every year. The walk along the cliff is a scenic one and also great for a variety of interesting plants, birds and a few herps. The trail head at Garie Beach is about a 40 minute drive from my home in Wollongong. I recognize the spot where you were looking for water skinks. The crossing there is a good place for them and they are fairly tame.

Bandy-bandies are great snakes, don't you think? Their defenisve display is so strange.

I can help you with some of the ids.

Gecko 1: Eastern Stone Gecko (Diplodactylus vittatus)
Gecko 2: Thick-tailed Gecko (Underwoodisaurus or Nephrurus milii)

The blind snake would most likely be Ramphotyphlops nigrescens

The "myna" is the honeyeater, Noisy Miner.

You are correct about the honeyeater being New Holland. They are super abundant in Royal.

The "unknown bird" (first) is a special species. It is a Rock Warbler or Origma, a species that is only found in the sandstone formations around Sydney.

"another unknown bird" is probably a Brown Thornbill.

The butterfly is a nice one and called a "Varied Swordgrass Brown".

Snorkelling/Diving is always a fun thing to do. Late in the summer, we pick up a few of the tropicals as well that are pushed south by the east Australia current. Your underwater pics are very nice. What camera did you use for these?

Fish40: One of the Leatherjackets
Fish38: Sergeant (left) and one of the breams (right)
Fish31: Sea Carp
Fish25: The neon-like fish are called Hula Fish. The triangular, tetra-like fish are one of the bullseyes.
Fish10: Crimson-breasted Wrasse. This was a male a nicely coloured.
Fish24: Red Morwong



Regards.
David
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dery
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Location: huntsville

Re: Christmas in Australia

Post by dery »

Nice way of spending any holiday.
User avatar
ksuglennj
Posts: 193
Joined: June 7th, 2010, 10:36 am
Location: Monticello,AR
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Re: Christmas in Australia

Post by ksuglennj »

Thanks a bunch for the IDs David. I was hoping that you would see this post and help me out.
moloch wrote:Bandy-bandies are great snakes, don't you think? Their defenisve display is so strange.
They are a trip. Turned out they were the most common snake we saw. I do not know if it was the time of year or what, but we found 3 in the same basic area. We only found one of any other snake (except a dor redbelly black to go with the live one). I don't get what the advantage is to that defensive posture, but it did entertain us.
moloch wrote:Your underwater pics are very nice. What camera did you use for these?
I use an Olympus Stylus Tough and if I remember my model is the 6020. For what it costs, it has been a fun little camera. It is junk when trying to get animal shots on land and especially at night but has been priceless for snorkeling.

Glenn
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ksuglennj
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Joined: June 7th, 2010, 10:36 am
Location: Monticello,AR
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Re: Christmas in Australia

Post by ksuglennj »

gretzkyrh4 wrote:Looks like you guys had a great trip. Wish Melina and I had the time/money to make it down there and visit Van for a bit. Thanks for sharing.

Chris

Well if you two weren't so busy going to Panama so much, geese. :D

Glenn
KEAC
Posts: 39
Joined: September 27th, 2010, 3:51 pm

Re: Christmas in Australia

Post by KEAC »

Nice variety of animals. I'm not into birding but your bird IDs pretty much explained most of what I saw while down there. Hopefully I get the warm weather on my next trip so the herps show up too. I really like the Royal NP too, very scenic. You have to visit QLD next time too. Thanks for bringing back the good memories.
Darin
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Eric East
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Joined: July 5th, 2010, 5:44 pm
Location: Greenwood, AR

Re: Christmas in Australia

Post by Eric East »

Very jealous!
gretzkyrh4
Posts: 661
Joined: June 7th, 2010, 12:17 pm
Location: Baton Rouge, LA

Re: Christmas in Australia

Post by gretzkyrh4 »

ksuglennj wrote:
gretzkyrh4 wrote:Looks like you guys had a great trip. Wish Melina and I had the time/money to make it down there and visit Van for a bit. Thanks for sharing.

Chris

Well if you two weren't so busy going to Panama so much, geese. :D

Glenn
Well those trips tend to be free, so it's a little hard to turn them down.

Chris
speedy
Posts: 77
Joined: May 26th, 2012, 6:44 pm
Location: Brisbane, Australia

Re: Christmas in Australia

Post by speedy »

Well done, you certainly saw quite a bit.

Here are some fish ID's if required.

Fish 40 Yellow fin Leatherjacket
Fish 38 Yellow fin bream and a Bengal Sergent Major
Fish 31 is a kelpfish in the family Chironemus
Fish 25 Are a school of Mono's down below (Monodactylus argenteus), i forgot what the small ones are above (Thanks to David they are Hula fish).
Fish 19 is a male Blue Groper
Fish 18 I think it is a school of Brown Blubberlips, however it could be drummer. Difficult angle to tell.
Fish 11 are Mado
Fish 10 is a Crimson band Wrasse
Fish 01 is another Yellow fin Bream
Fish 24 is a Red Morwong.

Edit: I didnt realise David had already given fish ID's. I thought he had only done everything else. Anyway hopefully i have helped some more.
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