Terry Smith Lookout Rest Area

Visited: winter

Recommendation: This is another hidden hotspot. Travellers provide water for the birds and they come to drink. Lots of them and lots of different species. You could just spend the day sitting and watching.

The Terry Smith Lookout rest area doesn't appear on Google Maps but you can find information about it on apps showing free camping places. It is about an hour north of Cloncurry on the Matilda Way to Normanton. It is a very pleasant place to stay as some wonderful person had rigged up a water bowl against a tree. As soon I arrived I could see honeyeaters whizzing to and from it. I parked up so the door of my camper was a couple of metres away from the bowl and settled down. The following 24 hours were a wonderful birding experience. 

It really was a tale of the honeyeaters, although there was also Budgerigars, Woodswallows, Brown Quail and the odd sounding Rufous Songlark. At times even the timid Peaceful and Diamond Doves would try and get a drink from the bowl but the Grey-fronted Honeyeater would chase them away. These aggressive honeyeaters would only give way to the much larger Yellow-throated Miners who would descend every now and again in twos and threes and force everyone else out. I had to refill the bowl every hour. These birds were thirsty.

Grey-fronted Honeyeater (ptilotula plumula)

My problem was that I was unfamiliar with these honeyeaters. Those that might be present that I have seen before I still probably wouldn't recognise and I knew there would be several species with yellow, white and black facial markings that would be hard to separate. Without that water bowl I certainly would have missed some great birds.

Every now and again a different honeyeater would turn up and I wouldn't immediately know what it was, just that it was different. More photos and the bird book helped. The Singing Honeyeater and the Grey-headed Honeyeater would sneak in alone to drink and then would be gone. I got used to this happening and would sit and watch the Grey-fronted Honeyeater until they (or a different one) returned. 

In the background were always the doves. They would have to sneak in a visit to the water and they did so with the usual grace and peaceful attitude. Watching them made a pleasant change from the raucous nature of the honeyeaters.

And just in case you (like me) can't tell those honeyeaters apart: