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Visited: all year round
Recommendation: This tiny patch of conservation reserve is one of the most wonderful wildlife spots I have ever been to. My advice is simply to go there, any time of year.
Abbatoir Swamp and Hunter Creek Park are within a kilometre of each other along the Mount Molloy - Julatten road. I find it quite amazing that 2 small areas can host a completely different set of birds, because one is dry and one is rainforest. I have visited Abbatoir Swamp many times over the years and will continue to return whenever I can.
At Abattoir Swamp, you pull in to a small circular track and there are little informal bays to park. It is a well looked after area with lovely touches like a sign to leave the tap dripping for the birds. It is a very small area, only a few metres of forest surrounding the track and a path leading to the swamp. In previous years, I have found the swamp to be the best part but it is grown over at times making it difficult to see anything from the hide. There is always much to see on the short boardwalk to the swamp hide and the rest of the area though. The Brown Honeyeater dominates the trees around the boardwalk with a call that is surprisingly loud given how small they are.
It is worth spending time here. If you sit quietly, you can sometimes hear crake and one time I was lucky enough to see an Azure Kingfisher hunting close to the hide. That was a magical experience.
The Azure Kingfisher is a small but vibrantly colored bird. It has a deep azure blue head, neck, and upper parts with a violet sheen. The underparts are orange-rufous, and the legs and feet are red. Both males and females have similar plumage, although juveniles are duller in color.
This small kingfisher is a perch hunter, meaning it sits on a branch or other perch overlooking the water and dives down to catch prey. It eats small fish, crustaceans, aquatic insects, and other invertebrates. This is exactly what I found it doing.
On one visit I was very lucky to catch one darting amongst the trees outside the hide. I waited patiently and eventually it came back and spent around an hour fishing. I must have taken 100 shots of it and all except 2 had something obscuring this beautiful, tiny bird. I was thrilled to get a clear shot of it and it remains one of my favourites.
Azure Kingfisher (Ceyx azureus)
Eastern Yellow Robin (Eopsaltria australis)
Northern Fantail (Rhipidura rufiventris)
Back in the forested areas there seems to always be an Eastern Yellow Robin or 2 who are usually obliging. During my several recent visits, I also found a Northern Fantail resident there as well. Larger than the more common Grey Fantail, it was also slower and less noisy. My first time getting close to one.
Also in the bush was a pair of Brown Cuckoo-Dove which are normally very shy. I had to creep around a lot to get close to them and was surprised by how beautiful their plumage really was.
This large dove gets its name from its tail, not because it's related to cuckoos. The dove has a long tail with barring (dark and light bands) on the underside. When it is in flight, this barred underside of the tail looks similar to the tail of a cuckoo bird.
Brown Cuckoo-Dove (Macropygia phasianella)
Varied Sittella (Daphoenositta chrysoptera)
On two separate visits I found a family of Varied Sittella. I always think of them as upside down treecreepers as they work down the tree rather than up. Varied is a very apt name as their plumage seems to be a wide range of colours and striations.
In fact, there are five subspecies of Varied Sittella, which differ in the patterns of their heads, necks, and wings, as well as the amount of streaking on their bodies. All adult Varied Sittellas are greyish above and white below, with streaks. They have an orange-yellow iris, a yellow eye-ring, legs, and feet. Their bill is long, slender, and slightly upturned.
Varied Sittellas are insectivores, and they find their food by hopping down tree trunks and branches, searching in cracks and crevices for insects. They are known for their loud, chattering calls.
The highlight of my visits was always the Yellow-breasted Boatbill. It has a distinctive, almost electronic warble and it is such an unusual bird you always want to photograph it. I heard it and glimpsed it several times before I eventually got in the right place at the right time to shoot it. Marvellous.
The boatbill's impressively large bill is an adaptation that helps it thrive as an insectivore in the rainforest environment. The unusually large and broad bill is designed for the catching of its main diet – insects. The shape allows the bird to scoop up insects efficiently, both airborne and ones resting on leaves or the forest floor. The hooked tip of the beak further aids in catching and manoeuvring prey among the foliage.
Yellow-breasted Boatbill (Machaerirhynchus flaviventer)
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