Our great southern migration

  We have an echidna growing up on the farm! I first saw it down by the creek. I managed to scare it into the round ball below. Usually they burrow into the sand but this was clay so burrowing was hard.  After surviving the initial scare, it seems to have gotten very bold. We see it going up and down the road and wandering through the paddocks We have also seen an adult echidna but they do not travel together. These would be one of my favorite creatures! We also have substantial kangaroo families, but the youngsters stay pretty close to mom. This is the view from the kitchen window on many mornings. This youngster has only recently ventured out of the pouch, despite his size. He definitely knew who his mother was.  The juveniles (out of maternal protection) often have a big brother as care-taker. They do venture in other areas besides this spot bbehind the garden. This one was outside our bedroom one morning.  Another one stopped by the front door, seeming to want an...

  This guy was sitting across the river, waiting to be noticed. We were carefully watching the river for platypus (none seen) and then looked up to see him preening. Flame robin!  This small one is a scarlet honeyeater - they don't sit still very long and develop the red heads over time (like goldfinches turning more golden) Another small one with red parts - red-browed firetail finch. They are even smaller and are typically on the ground. One of the first small birds I chased down with the camera. This pic is one of Scott's.  Scott saw a firetail finch without a red brow as we were investigating a park in Victoria, Aus. However, I missed the shot and we didn't find it again. And this guy has a red butt - red-rumped parrot. We saw this particular parrot at Aunt Berenice's farm but found more on travels through Victoria We are currently in Goolwa, South Australia. To get to this state, we passed from New South Wales and through Victoria. We stopped at two cities along th...

  Most of the Australian jellyfish are also full of toxins. The main ones to worry about are those that hae been beached. Stepping on them is still painful! The blue-bottles (aka Portugese Man o'War) is apparently four creatures merged into one. From the Australian museum website : The float (pneumatophore) is a single individual and supports the rest of the colony. The tentacles (dactylozooids) are polyps concerned with the detection and capture of food and convey their prey to the digestive polyps (gastrozooids). Reproduction is carried out by the gonozooids, another type of polyp.  J is also for journey. The waiting list for cardiology evaluations is just as long here as in the US. Because my pacemaker was no longer under remote monitoring, they found me an earlier appointment - in Canberra. We could and did do it and I feel more comfortable that I will soon have it back under an alert system. However, it was a 3 hour trek each way (over the mountains). We stopped at a nati...