Best Xmas present ever

The next two weeks are going to be the busiest ever for our little chick and so if we want the best Xmas present ever, we all need to keep pitching in to ensure the chick's survival.

I have included a roster at the bottom and am asking volunteers to please sign up for which dates and shifts they would like to commit to. I really need to have 3 people plus me per shift during this busy period; hopefully our final 2 weeks before the chick fledges. I will be putting out a call to our local community asking for help via Facebook later in the week, but I am not expecting a huge response as people are generally busy hosting family.

We need to ensure the chick gets to feed regularly during this period, rather than hiding in the mangroves with parents on guard duty, if we want to meet the fledging timetable. Once the chick has fledged we can say “we’ve done it”, pat each other on the back, and get publicity for a truly outstanding nature event for Sydney.

Update:

This week is the end of week 3 for the little chick, and has, thank goodness, been less stressful. The calm before the storm I think.

The swim the chick did on day 16 saw a cormorant pop up behind it when it was about to hit the shore, and did that little chick kick into a higher gear. The first thing it did when it hit shore was squat.

Day 17 I ventured out in the morning to do some shopping as there was nothing left in the fridge. When I arrived home I put the things that needed refrigerating into the fridge and headed straight out to the beach before unpacking everything. I was at the bottom of my stairs when I heard the parent oystercatchers making a dreadful racket up at the fenced safety roosting zone (it was high tide). I hurried up there to find an osprey on one of the fence poles. The parent birds were flying at it trying to make it leave. By the time I arrived it had departed but there is a family group of 3 ospreys regularly visiting the Cabbage Tree Creek and Bonnievale lagoon area. It was a family group of 4 but one was discovered dead on Horderns Beach, cause unknown. One of the ospreys I photographed on Deeban Spit showed signs of feathers missing from the chest area and also the back of the neck.

There are still regular interloper oystercatcher chases. I recorded 4 interloper oystercatchers on one of my walks at the end of the Spit opposite where our nesting birds are sitting, making a total of 7 for the Spit, something of a record in my history or recording here.

We’ve had a team of grazing wood ducks regularly moving through the fenced safety roosting zone while the oystercatchers are sitting out the high tide.

I’ve also seen the first of the little terns fishing along the beach front and one of the days I was out there I recorded 5. They make a heck of a racket when there is a group fishing and because they fish so close to shore it is a truly wonderful view.

Fox and deer tracks are also around the fenced zone on a regular basis, I don’t know why the fox is now making regular visits when it had not been coming for days at a time. Perhaps with more people now visiting the beach with the weather now having warmed up there are morsels for it to clean up. I did on two occasions find piles of discarded prawns beside one of the popular fishing spots, directly outside the fenced safety roosting zone.

This weekend we saw very low high tides, quite late in the day. There was very little water in the lagoon, not all of the mangrove area was under water so the birds did not bother to bring the little chick to the fenced safety roosting zone (shame no photos and no real idea how much it has grown all weekend, but it did look really big through the binoculars). One parent bird did fly over at high tide as roosting on dry sand is normal, but the other stayed with the chick. These days have coincided with severe thunder storm warnings.

Another thing I’ve noticed is how much the Bonnievale lagoon has changed since the campgrounds have been closed. Normally it is all dark coloured and looks like a moonscape, lots of mounds and divets. The mounds and divets are gone, and they are all sand coloured again. I have also noticed that the samphire, which was close to disappearing all together, appearing again.

Roster required 26 December to 31 December

A number of you have indicated that you are free over the Xmas period to help with guiding beach users around the oystercatcher family to ensure the chick’s safety.

Here are the dates and times I need volunteers. I need 3 people per team on each day (6 a day) so, please, if you can sign up to more than one day our birds will appreciate it. We don’t have a great number in the volunteer pool due to it being holidays. The chick will only be around 2 weeks away from fledging so we can’t fall at this final challenge. I will confirm with you all the dates you have nominated for and next week send a roster for the New Year period, which will hopefully complete the oystercatcher nesting.