G'day all,
This is from the last herping trip I did in Perth. It's been posted on another forum so you may have already read this.
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I've had a few weekends to go herping locally so I've decided to knock off a few of the "within reason" species. These are critters that don't occur immediately in the Perth surrounds, but within a "not-too-far" drive (about 2hrs or so).
So, with a weekend up my sleeve and noone to go with I rolled my swagged, packed my camp burner with some packets of instant "Mi-Goreng" (students choice!) and headed north of Perth to some of the larger areas of intact bushland that still exist.
Although Delma concinna (previously Aclys) occurs within the perth region it ain't that common there. There's alot more records north of Perth, so along with some obscure geckos, I set off to bag myself a few "ticks" before the year was out. I'd already cracked the requisite 50 for the year (see Stewart Macdonald's threads) so anything else was a bonus. Plus I was bored.
A few weeks earlier a fairly well-known herper was down in Perth trying for Pletholax (like me, he failed to find any). He did however get onto a striped gecko Strophurus michaelseni. I was keen to see one (i've not seen a striped strophurus yet) and he put me onto the general area to search.
Anyway, off i headed through such lovely towns as Bindoon and Mogumber before I arrived at the rough location I was given. These "purgatory" towns are dumps as Perth is close enough to drive so very little infrastructure/development occurs there. Bindoon has a nice bakery though... I had a few hours of daylight so I wandered around and drove the roads, making rough notes on locations that I thought I might find geckos in. Dancing around in the heath when I stopped to pee was Ctenophorus maculatus, an incredibly fast dragon that, at 35degrees air temp, was going to be impossible to catch. I tried and really only increased the dragons self-belief in it's own abilities. I should have tried to get an in-situ shot... I drove 80kms in a circuit before it got dark and arrived at my initial site for geckos. I didn't think it would be easy, so I was prepared for a long night in the scrub.
About 10 minutes after dark and 20 seconds after leaving the car, I saw a big bright set of eyeshine...
Yep, they were that easy. Find the right spot and they were plentiful (just like anything I guess). I ended up seeing about 20 of them. There are more photos on Henry Cook's Photo Galleries at pbase.com under "recent".
I spent a lot of time photographing these geckos. Such a beautiful species and so difficult to photograph. They constantly were on the move and loved to drop into the matrix of spinifex grass beneath them.
As I'd achieved my primary goals almost immediately so I decided to keep heading around to some of my sites and to see if my predictions were correct. After visiting a few more sites I only found a few more michaelseni. It seems they are fairly patchy, locally speaking... I did find a few more Gehyra variegata as well as a new tick for me, Diplodactylus ornatus.
This gross little skinny male with a bung tail was the only individual I found. I was lucky I bothered to photograph it.
It started to get a bit cooler so I headed west towards the coast, hoping to pick something up on the road while it still held some heat. No much to report, but I did get a common species I'd yet to find in the wild. I removed a few Strophurus spinigeris from the road and posed them a few unnatural poses
.
I didn't get anything else until the next morning, where I drove to a spot that was meant to be good for Delma concinna (it wasn't good for Delma concinna in the end). Although I dipped on them I was lucky enough to see a lovely young shingleback crossing the road. I stuck on my wide angle lens and got a few shots with my trusty car.
More shots of each these species in "recent" at Henry Cook's Photo Galleries at pbase.com as well as a big nasty mygalomorph spider I found.
-H
This is from the last herping trip I did in Perth. It's been posted on another forum so you may have already read this.
--------------------
I've had a few weekends to go herping locally so I've decided to knock off a few of the "within reason" species. These are critters that don't occur immediately in the Perth surrounds, but within a "not-too-far" drive (about 2hrs or so).
So, with a weekend up my sleeve and noone to go with I rolled my swagged, packed my camp burner with some packets of instant "Mi-Goreng" (students choice!) and headed north of Perth to some of the larger areas of intact bushland that still exist.
Although Delma concinna (previously Aclys) occurs within the perth region it ain't that common there. There's alot more records north of Perth, so along with some obscure geckos, I set off to bag myself a few "ticks" before the year was out. I'd already cracked the requisite 50 for the year (see Stewart Macdonald's threads) so anything else was a bonus. Plus I was bored.
A few weeks earlier a fairly well-known herper was down in Perth trying for Pletholax (like me, he failed to find any). He did however get onto a striped gecko Strophurus michaelseni. I was keen to see one (i've not seen a striped strophurus yet) and he put me onto the general area to search.
Anyway, off i headed through such lovely towns as Bindoon and Mogumber before I arrived at the rough location I was given. These "purgatory" towns are dumps as Perth is close enough to drive so very little infrastructure/development occurs there. Bindoon has a nice bakery though... I had a few hours of daylight so I wandered around and drove the roads, making rough notes on locations that I thought I might find geckos in. Dancing around in the heath when I stopped to pee was Ctenophorus maculatus, an incredibly fast dragon that, at 35degrees air temp, was going to be impossible to catch. I tried and really only increased the dragons self-belief in it's own abilities. I should have tried to get an in-situ shot... I drove 80kms in a circuit before it got dark and arrived at my initial site for geckos. I didn't think it would be easy, so I was prepared for a long night in the scrub.
About 10 minutes after dark and 20 seconds after leaving the car, I saw a big bright set of eyeshine...
Yep, they were that easy. Find the right spot and they were plentiful (just like anything I guess). I ended up seeing about 20 of them. There are more photos on Henry Cook's Photo Galleries at pbase.com under "recent".
I spent a lot of time photographing these geckos. Such a beautiful species and so difficult to photograph. They constantly were on the move and loved to drop into the matrix of spinifex grass beneath them.
As I'd achieved my primary goals almost immediately so I decided to keep heading around to some of my sites and to see if my predictions were correct. After visiting a few more sites I only found a few more michaelseni. It seems they are fairly patchy, locally speaking... I did find a few more Gehyra variegata as well as a new tick for me, Diplodactylus ornatus.
This gross little skinny male with a bung tail was the only individual I found. I was lucky I bothered to photograph it.
It started to get a bit cooler so I headed west towards the coast, hoping to pick something up on the road while it still held some heat. No much to report, but I did get a common species I'd yet to find in the wild. I removed a few Strophurus spinigeris from the road and posed them a few unnatural poses
.
I didn't get anything else until the next morning, where I drove to a spot that was meant to be good for Delma concinna (it wasn't good for Delma concinna in the end). Although I dipped on them I was lucky enough to see a lovely young shingleback crossing the road. I stuck on my wide angle lens and got a few shots with my trusty car.
More shots of each these species in "recent" at Henry Cook's Photo Galleries at pbase.com as well as a big nasty mygalomorph spider I found.
-H
