Mark, Lumart, Jaap and I had our hands full with a wide variety of critters in MacDonald National Park. I filmed a skink, a house centipede on a leaf, which stood out from its background far more than the previous specimens in my footage. I also filmed a moth, a juvenile carpet python in a tree, a pie dish beetle, a moulting cockroach and a male wasp belonging to a sub-family whose males are winged and carry around the females during mating. We found the most spectacular subject, new to all of us, on our way out – a batwing gum moth caterpillar. It is one of Australia’s biggest. I estimate it was more than 12 cm long and was nearly as thick as my thumb. At first it was still, but then began to move and gyrate.
We succeeded in getting a full night’s filming in MacDonald National Park at the third attempt. On the first occasion two weeks ago Jaap and Lumart were driven crazy by mosquitos and we had to abandon the walk. Last week was bitterly cold and windy. To-night was comparatively balmy, though we continue to experience below average daytime temperatures. I filmed a small, roosting bird on a low branch next to the path, some fascinating white fungi which poked above the earth like ghostly fingers and an owl chick resting on the ground. It would have been between two and three weeks old. Jaap, who is overseas, would not have been pleased to have missed it
The 2017-18 night filming season began with a walk in The Knoll. Jaap, Mark and Lumart were the crew. I filmed a very hairy caterpillar which I had previously filmed in Palm Grove; a large hunting beetle crawling on a tree near a huntsman spider; and for the second time, a flatworm with a yellow and brown stripe down its back.
It is a month ago to the day since I last filmed, having been engaged on a pet project, of which more in due course. This morning I filmed a broken strangler fig in MacDonald National Park whose trunk mysteriously snapped off some thirty feet above the forest floor. The fig was old and vast, one of a pair standing side by side. The fallen trunk generated an immense clearing, bringing down lesser trees, including palms.
Looking back through the blog, I notice that I first filmed the Cotton Harlequin Bugs on the 8th of April. On the 17th I filmed a female with her newly laid eggs, discovering that she would stay and guard them until they hatch. On various subsequent visits there she was, a marvel of maternal constancy. This morning I filmed the nymphs scrabbling in a clump on the egg casings a day or so after emerging, with the by now rather wan-looking female, on an adjacent stem.
Having just completed our 150th walk I thought it might be interesting to delve into the history of the walks and tally how many we did per season (broadly, October to May). In doing so I discovered I was one walk short in the total to this season’s end. We have actually completed 153. The 150th occurred a week earlier than the ‘official’ date. I didn’t start numbering the walks until a few seasons had passed. And then, I didn’t number every walk. The tally per season is: ’07 –’08 = 5 ’08 – ’09 = 10 ’09 – ’10 = 13 ’10 –’11 = 26 ’11 – ’12 = 19 ’12 –’13 = 16 ’13 – ’14 = 13 ’14 –’15 = 16 ’15 – ’16 = 16 ’16 – ’17 = 19. You will notice that in the second season we doubled the number of walks of season one and in the fourth, we doubled the number of walks in season three.
I next tallied how many walks we had done in each of the national parks. Joalah topped the list with 47, followed by The Knoll with 43, MacDonald with 31, Palm Grove 25, Witches… Read Complete Text
We toasted the 150th walk with a half bottle of champagne at the start of the 151st because Jaap, who spotlighted the very first walk, was able to accompany Mark, Lumart and me in Palm Grove on what may be this season’s last walk. The night was beautiful, the air still. I filmed a fungus and ants, a mayfly with 3 tail cerci (long filaments attached to the tip of the abdomen), a small stick insect on a leaf, a ‘new’ spider and two snails. We saw, but didn’t film, a nocturnal vignette. A large ant was wandering on an earth bank dotted with the burrows of several trapdoor spiders, until it came within range of a small spider lying in wait at the entrance to its burrow. In an instantaneous, single movement the spider seized the hapless ant and vanished into the depths with its prey. This triggered the door to snap shut on the carnage so that one could be excused for thinking it had never happened.
This evening I received an email identifying a roosting bird I had recently filmed at night in rainforest. It was a new species for the archive. This, I had not expected. Finding a new species of bird to film is increasingly rare. Whereas the opposite appears to be true with moths. Encountering a juvenile Pacific Heron a few weeks ago, having long before filmed an adult, was exciting. But a new species beats that.
Tonight at The Knoll, Mark and Lumart were present on the 150th night filming walk. The series began at the end of December 2007. The intention is to go on a walk once a week. However, we do not film during the cooler months and crew crying off and rain on the night drastically affects the number of occasions we manage to film. The total does not include the rare instances when I didn’t film anything at all. I feared this might be the case tonight until we saw a giant panda snail devouring a fungus which was part of an interesting cluster, so I filmed both. I also filmed some tiny fungi and a slime mould. After cyclone Debbie there is plenty of water in the mountain’s creeks. I hoped to see the eel, whose presence in Sandy Creek we never suspected until it appeared just over two years ago in a pool which formed immediately downstream of the bridge thanks to ex-cyclone Oswald. Alas, there was no sign of the eel in the pool. To our great joy it was spotted in the pool immediately upstream of the bridge, but did not linger long enough for me… Read Complete Text
Night filming with Jaap and Mark in Joalah is only worth noting because it was the first such foray since February 22nd due mainly to crew availability and only one rainy night. I filmed a moth, a spiny rainforest katydid instar, a carpet python and a snail which looked new to me.