Category: Birdwatching

With the superb winter weather at Paluma, every week sees a ‘flock’ of birdwatchers visiting the village and surrounds to search out and photograph our birdlife. Last week, Murray and Dawn Frick spent time at Paluma and were hosted by Don Battersby at Hussey Road. Don provided some free mealworms and the birds arrived.

Murray and Dawn are sugarcane farmers from Bundaberg and this is their fourth trip to Paluma for birdwatching. When they are not working on the farm they love to travel around Australia. They are on their way home after seven weeks on the road, traveling some 10,000 kilometres throughout Queensland and the Northern Territory.

They first came to Paluma some years ago in search of the golden bowerbird. This trip they have photographed the golden whistler, satin bowerbird, rifle bird and many other species. Murray and Dawn say they are never disappointed when they come to Paluma as they know “we will always get good birds here”. We wish Murray and Dawn a safe trip home to Bundaberg and we hope to see you next year!

Paluma is regularly visited by bird watcher’s from all over Australia and from around the world. This weekend (11 August) Ken Russell spent the day in the village, walking many of the local tracks. Ken lives in Victoria and he is a Member of Birdlife East Gippsland.

This was Ken’s second trip to Paluma and he spent the day searching for and photographing a variety of rainforest birds. He was especially keen on capturing images of the catbird, chowchilla, riflebird, noisy pitta, regent bowerbird and wompoo pigeon.

By all accounts, Ken had a very successful day, capturing some great images of a brazen catbird, riflebirds, satin bowerbirds and numerous other species. The chowchilla remained elusive and is still on Ken’s list of rainforest birds to photograph.