Australia - Perth - Thompsons Nature Reserve - Early to Rise... !

The next stop in my adventure is Perth Austraia where I will be staying with my pal Lou who has lined up plenty of good things to do during the first part of my stay with her. No journey would be complete without a visit to the local soccer Australian A League Perth Glory v Sydney FC a game that the Glory held on to their top spot in the league with a 3 – 1 victory.

Earlier on in the day I took a walk over to Thompson Lake Nature Reserve and had a very chaotic first couple of hours watching my feathered friends. The reserve is fenced with intermittent single person entry gates around the perimeter. If you visit this reserve mark these on your maps as there are no signs indicating where they are!

The reserve is also served by an outer ring walkway which has been developed with small boardwalks as you negotiate the perimeter from the housing side. Just inside the fence is a heavy sand track for 4x4 vehicles. Once you have negotiated that the inner circuit is a mix of sand and baked earth which leads to open areas where you can use tall clumps of grass to sneak up on the shorebirds and ducks that use the lake to feed. There was still plenty of water present during my visit but this may vary dependant on rainfall!

During the crazee period of the morning where my eyes had to be everywhere watching commuting parrots and cormorants as well as enticing passerines out from the bush. There were also plenty of duck on the ponds en-route to the main lake. Fantastic!

Rainbow Lorikeets seemed to be everywhere flying in small groups into nearby trees.

Galah made a noisy but spectacular entry as this pink blob descending from the skies dropping like a stone into the trees.

The local Magpies are extremely aggressive and have been known to attack people during their breeding season. Thankfully that is during September to October and is over for this year.

Yellow billed Spoonbill was infrequent but an amazing sight as they relocated from feeding grounds.

Cormorants were represented by Little pied who were frequent fliers.

Little Black Cormorants were obviously earlier starters remaining in place for breakfast!

During the morning I took around 400 photos which is still a work in progress... Part II – Wildfowl which contains one of my favourite families the Ducks!!