[moloch]

I was very fortunate on my recent trip to Queensland to travel with two enthusiastic young herpers that I met on one of the Aussie herp forums. Gus helped me tremendously in the Townsville and Mackay areas and showed me several of the range restricted Leaf-tailed Geckos (Phyllurus). Gus had searched the literature and had gone on reconnaissance trips before my visit to locate the homes of some of the really special geckos. I never would have seen these animals without his help and I am most appreciative.

After leaving Gus at Townsville, I drove 9 hours north to Cooktown where I stayed with Nick and Holly. They are a lovely couple that just amazed me with their hospitality. Nick kindly offered to take me to the Iron Range National Park, a place that I have long wanted to visit. Nick has explored the park on a number of occasions and knew good areas to visit and also knew of a nice place to stay. Getting to this park requires a 4x4 since the road is unpaved and can turn to muck with a heavy shower. Our visit coincided with the start of the wet season and there was a heavy downpour in central Cape York the night before we left. The wet immediately brought out animals at night and we ended up seeing several species of snakes. It also made the drive out rather interesting when we found ourselves trapped for awhile by a road train that could not pull itself out of a river crossing.

The Iron Range is a special place and really is like a piece of New Guinea that has been trapped in Australia. Many plants and animals are only found here. It is an essential destination for Aussie birders and it would be the equivalent of the Chiracahuas or the lower Rio Grande Valley to birders in the States. On our three-day visit, we saw most of the special birds and Nick even found the first reported Red-bellied Pitta of the year.

When travelling east into the Iron Range, the road initially passes through these heath covered hills. This is the Mt. Tozer area. There are many strange plants here including a climbing Pitcher Plant and orchids. Unfortunately, we did not have time to try and find these.


We returned to this area once at night but this was before the rain arrived and it was quiet. We did not see any reptiles at all. We did see these interesting inverts and plants:





We visited a coastal area near Lockhart River on our first morning at the Iron Range.



... rock with resting Crested Terns.


We found this Nactus eboracensis not far from the beach. It was a new species to us and is restricted to Cape York.







The Iron Range seems to be a mosaic of Eucalyptus woodland with patches of rainforest. Forest like this was common and it proved to be popular with the parrots. We were told of a special eucalyptus tree that we visited. It had several hollow branches and these were the nesting sites for two pairs of Sulphur-crested ****atoos, two pairs of Eclectus Parrots, one pair of Rainbow Lorikeets and nearby, a nesting pair of Palm ****atoos.




Palm ****atoo -- These spectacular birds were new to me. We ended up seeing perhaps 18 birds in different parts of the park. We even saw and heard them flying over the cabins where we stayed near Lockhart River. Their calls were loud like Sulphur-crested ****atoos but also included strange warbling sounds.
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Sulphur-crested ****atoo -- these were nesting in hollow branches of this gum.





Eclectus Parrot -- this is a lousy shot but it shows the incredible sexual dimorphism of Eclectus Parrots. The green male can be seen at the lower left of the photo and the red and purple female is in the open. This species would be one of the few parrots where the female is more brightly coloured than the male.



Closed-litter rainbow-skink (Carlia longipes) -- these were common in dry, grassy areas.
breeding male:


female (I think)


This was a very large Carlia so I think it was C. longipes rather than C. dogare even though it has 2 lobes on the anterior opening of the ear.


juvenile:



We found this odd little scorpion under a piece of metal:



Most of our time was spent exploring the rainforest of the Iron Range since this was the home of the animals that we wanted to see the most. This view shows the forest along the road. In most areas, the rainforest was not particularly tall but there were areas along rivers where the forest was better developed.


We saw the eye shine of a small crocodile here at night.



We found a few Scrub Pythons (Morelia kinghorni).

This one was crossing the road:



And this one was hunting in the forest along a creek:




I am very interested to know the identity of these big Gehyra. We found two of these while searching (unsuccessfully) for Giant Tree Geckos (Pseudothecadactylus australis). The first animal below was huge and when Nick pointed it out to me, I thought that it must have been our target species. I don't know what they are and there is nothing in the field guide that is large like this from the Iron Range. I suspect that they are an undescribed but probably known gecko or possibly a large species that is known from the Torres Strait Islands.





Wood Frog (Rana daemeli) -- our one and only species of Rana.



I am not certain but think this to be an oddly marked Graceful Tree Frog (Litoria gracilenta):




Black-tailed Bar-lipped Skink (Glaphyromorphus nigricaudis) -- We saw these skinks during the day as well as on our night walks.





Tarantula



Shrub Whiptail Skink (Emoia longicauda) -- another new herp. It looked a little like an oversize Cryptoblepharus but was not particularly nervous and allowed us to closely approach it.






Chestnut-breasted Cuckoo -- This is another bird that is restricted to Cape York. It is similar to the widespread Fan-tailed Cuckoo that I see in my yard in Wollongong.



White-faced Robin -- Another Cape York restricted species.



We explored this patch of rainforest ... and found something special!





The highlight of the trip was locating the following species. Green Tree Python (Morelia viridis) was at the top of our wish list but we did not think that our chances were good to see one. We were positively stunned one afternoon when we spotted this snake about 4m up a tree. It blended so well and was hard to see even though it was curled around a branch in the open. Finding this species was extremely satisfying!







Wasp nest



Butterflies were excellent and diverse.
1. A beautiful Northern Jezabel
2. Union Jack Jezabel
3. Orange Aeroplane
4. Cape York Aeroplane
5. Common Aeroplane
6, 7. Hamadryad
8, 9. Lurcher
10, 11 Moths
12. Harlequin -- a lovely butterfly that is the sole representative of the Metal Mark family (Riodinidae) in Australia. It is restricted to Cape York.









Brown Tree Snake (Boiga irregularis) -- This snake exhibited very little pattern.




Brown-headed Snake (Furina tristis) -- another new elapid to me. This one was wild at first but then it settled down and hardly moved while we took a few photos.




A Major Skink (Bellatorias frerei) had its burrow at the base of this buttressed tree:





This was an impressive longicorn beetle (Cerambycid). It was huge!






Regards,
David

[van_veen456]

Wow! Nothing more I can say!

[Tariq Stark]

I second that Sjoerd! Wonderfull Nactus spp!

Tariq

[moloch]

Greetings,

I received feedback about the odd gecko from the Queensland Museum and also from a field biologist with the CSIRO. Both of these guys know of the odd Gehyra from the Iron Range (and down to Cooktown). One sent me copies of his photos and it looks much like those that Nick and I found.

The thought is that the gecko would probably key to what is known as G. dubia but they don't think that these really are G. dubia. The view is that Gehyra taxonomy is a mess and that the animal in my post would most likely be split into something new. It just needs someone to do a study like Horner did recently with Cryptoblepharus.

... hmmm, any grad students out there looking for a topic to study?


Regards,
David

[DDReptiles]

Originally Posted by moloch

... hmmm, any grad students out there looking for a topic to study?

Maybe they can pay my flight down there and I'll sit and study them all day!

I was thinking Pseudothecadactylus weren't found that far south? I was thinking they were only found at the very tip, but I also thought the same thing for GTP's so I'm probably wrong. Have Pseudothecadactylus been seen there before?

That GTP is a lucky find!! Really nice!

Some of those tree butresses are just insane!!

You need to make a book or something, I love how you include everything from the flowers and insects to the biggest animals.

Thanks Derek

[moloch]

Have Pseudothecadactylus been seen there before?

Yes, they are known from the Iron Range. When I searched on the net, I found photos of someones trip to this area. They found the gecko as well as several green tree pythons so did very well.


Regards,
David