I’m back in the forest after more than two weeks of rain. The sudden sunshine has brought out the colours, the insects and the birds! Everything is glistening and fresh-washed. I love it!
A pair of pale-headed rosellas (above) landed in a eucalypt at the edge of the rainforest. I wondered whether they were checking out the hollows for a nesting site. I could spot the usual suspects around here – pairs of Lewin’s Honeyeaters chasing each other around, Whipbirds cracking away, Rainbow Lorikeets ripping across the sky to check out the nectar. And of course the mountain’s gang of Sulphur-crested Cockatoos circling and drowning the rest of the avian voices with their harsh cries. Such self-proclaiming, self-satisfied birds!
And there were Figbirds too (pictured below, male on right); hardly surprising when the ground everywhere is littered with the blue fruits of the Blue Quandong (Eleocarpus grandis). In the days when I was very much into bush tucker I tried stewing and eating these fruits – horrible! But the large fruit-eating pigeons love them and so do the Figbirds, which are very evident this spring because there are fruiting Quandongs all over the mountain.
My favourite tree in this area, the fine specimen of Foambark (Jagera pseudorhus) on the edge of the escarpment is also having a fruitful year. It’s my favourite tree for miles around because it has such character – tall and twisting, its branches arranged like writhing limbs, in fact I’m sure it is really an Ent (if you are one of those sad people who don’t know what is an Ent, go read your Tolkein. Or at least see the films!). I also like the long, fernlike, compound leaves.
This week, around the base the ground is scattered with grooved, rusty fruits. These are the food of Satin and Regent Bowerbirds and also the Koel, which, having arrived for the summer about three weeks ago can be heard calling for long periods every day. It drives some people mad, but I like it! One of the sounds of the subtropical summer. It’s called the Rainbird by some because they think it’s call forecasts rain – whereas in reality it is only here during the rainy summer season and calls on dry days too!
I’ve read that Lewin’s Honeyeaters also eat the seeds of the Foambark but find this unlikely – for a start, they don’t forage on the ground and if they were to try extracting the seeds from fruit still on the tree I doubt their narrow, slender, curved, nectar-extracting bills would bills would be able to do that.
Perhaps the biggest thrill of the morning was seeing the waterhole, usually so modest in size and depth, full to overflowing and the colour changed from muddy grey-brown to that of a well-made cup of tea. I could hear Great Barred Frogs calling and no doubt if I went back at night I’d hear several other species of frog too.
At either end the small creek was flowing too, through banks of fern, no doubt happy to be on the run again instead of languishing in stagnating pools, as it was for the past few months.
Spring rain is so rare a blessing in this part of the world.
