Wildlife Viewing Boat - For Sale

 

Rarely do these specialised river boats come up for sale.

It is these types of boats that gave Daintree the reputation for seeing wildlife on their 2 hour dawn  river tours and started overnight accommodation in the Daintree.

Offered for sale with boatsales.portdouglas.website

Look under commercial - example

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Birdwatching App for Cairns & Tropical North Queensland

Screenshot of App for Marks Lane

This is an excellent app, such a good resource. We came from the UK during July and August this year and found these notes and excellent directions were exactly what we needed.

MARK'S LANE: This site in particular is not one that visitors would find easily. We had Bustards, Sarus Cranes, Spotted Harrier, several Black shouldered kites and lots of Whistling Kites along this road and thousands of Plumed Whistling Ducks at Lake Tinaroo at the end of the road.

The photographs of junctions and sites are particularly useful when looking for entrances to the right road. Thank you very much for this resource. Best value app we have ever bought!

Any chance of you extending the range to other birding areas on the East Coast?

Tom and Thelma, Focus on Birds

See Cairns Birdwatching

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Early Birds get the worms

Photo by Lance Peters

Wildlife photographer Lance Peters from Horsham in Victoria took out the Daintree Wildlife Photographic Competition in 2009 with this photo of a Black Bittern. He took it at dawn on one of the famous Daintree Dawn River Tours.

Rolf from London, Suzy from Wiepa, Loz from Nottingham and I retraced Lance's steps on Saturday 22 November 2014. We saw plenty including Black Bitterns, Papuan Frogmouths, Shining Flycatchers and Azure and Sacred Kingfishers.

Ian "Sauce" Worcester

We went with Sauce from Daintree River Wild Watch and had a great old time,

Next up we shared an Egg & Bacon Pie on the picnic tables at the jetty, wow.

After that Rolf and I went on a Daintree Bird Walk and Rolf ended up with smashing looks at Lovely Fairy-wren and Pied Monarch both of which are target species on the walk.

There is no doubt about it Daintree Village is a top world class birding spot provided you go with good guides and go early in the summer.

More at Daintree Birdwatching

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Bird Walk - 7:00am - Monday 10 November 2014

Bird Walk

See: Daintree Bird Walk

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They're Back

Buff-Breasted Paradise-Kingfisher

A single Buff-breasted Paradise-Kingfisher was seen and heard at Kingfisher Park, Julatten yesterday.

Photo by Jim Bendon

People watching.

If you look carefully in the centre of the photo there are two Welcome Swallows sitting on the boat.

In the height of the birdwatching season the Birding-Aus community were advising each other what was the best boat in Daintree to do a tour on.

As it turns out visiting birdwatchers have a choice of three operators who will take them out in small roofless boats at dawn and dusk for a modest fee.

That is a good tried and true formula that has been around since 1992. After that there are several factors that enter the equation. The obvious factor is luck. But luck can be influenced by, local knowledge, dedication to the task and lots of experience.

I was tickled to have Ian "Sauce" Worcester send me this photo of two Welcome Swallows watching his passengers during a recent tour.

Ian can be reached at: Daintree Wildlife

Local ornithologist to be honoured.

Lloyd Nielsen

On 1 November 2014 Mt Molloy man Lloyd Nielsen will be honoured with the John Hobbs medal, see note below.

Lloyd has a connection with Daintree wildlife that spans 24 years. He has contributed to birdwatching tourism in Queensland's Wet Tropics and self-published "Daintree - Jewel of Tropical North Queensland" - ISBN 0646 13545 5.

Professional birdwatching in Daintree was new in 1992 when Lloyd was researching his birdwatching field guide "Birds of Queensland's Wet Tropics and Great Barrier Reef" - ISBN 0646 27200 4. He helped the early birdwatching guides get a better grasp of birdwatching in one of the best venues in Australia - the Daintree River at dawn.

Bird book launch 1996
Present: Steve Noakes, Warren Entsch, Lloyd and Chris Dahlberg

Lloyd's connection was symbiotic, his field guide for birds was funded by Clipsal a South Australian manufacturing company whose General Manager was a visiting birdwatcher.
The assemblage at the book launch included the head of TNQ tourism, the federal member and a tourism pioneer.

NOTE: The John Hobbs Medal may be awarded annually by the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union for "outstanding contributions to ornithology as an amateur scientist".It commemorates John Hobbs (1920-1990) and was first awarded in 1995.

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The Dawn Chorus in the Douglas Shire

Black Butcherbird

With the birdwatching season in full swing and being spring the dawn chorus is more pronounced. The deep melodious songs in the pre-dawn, repeated over and over again are made by Black Butcherbirds and on the edges and a little later numerous Figbirds chime in with their more strident calls. 

Image: Magnus Kjaergaard

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Crocodile Warning Wonga Beach

Recent Crocodile sighting

This temporary crocodile warning sign is at the southern end of Wonga Beach. The Daintree River mouth is at the northern end. There are crocodiles in this area and at this time of the year they are much more active because they are breeding. Some of the younger male crocodiles are chased out of the Daintree River by the older males and end up at Wonga Beach.

Beach Stone-curlews.

It is birdwatching time here in the Wet Tropics and birdwatchers visit Wonga Beach to see birds, in particular Beach Stone-curlews.

If you want to see Beach Stone-curlews do not walk along the beach. Go to the beach from the several tracks leading down to the beach, look around and then go back the way you came. Don't turn at right angles and walk along the beach because there could be a crocodile at the back of the beach and you would be in direct line with it's escape route to the sea.

You can not outrun a crocodile.

http://www.tripadvisor.com.au/Travel-g499650-c162010/Daintree:Australia:Birdwatching.In.Daintree.html

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Daintree birdwatching time - Wonga Beach

Just sitting at my desk this morning I can hear four cuckoos. Channel-billed Cuckoo, Eastern Koel, Brush Cuckoo and Little Bronze-Cuckoo.

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