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Mission Beach
We arrived at Mission Beach in the late afternoon. Mission Beach is a coastal village that is surrounded by rainforest. Unfortunately, Cyclone Yasi did enormous damage to the area when in struck in February of this year. The rainforest canopy is gone for now. It will be a number of years before the plants regenerate to their prior beauty.
Here are a few before/after shots of the Mission Beach area:
Mission Beach in Nov 2010:
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3.../habitat3a.jpg
... now
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...h/habitat3.jpg
Lacey Creek area in Nov 2010:
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3.../habitat2a.jpg
... now
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...h/habitat2.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...h/habitat1.jpg
Birds, butterflies and reptiles were all relatively scarce. I was very pleased to see this Southern Cassowary one afternoon. There seemed to be little fruit available and I was afraid that their numbers might have been decimate by the cyclone. I spoke to the volunteers at the information centre and they think that only 9 Cassowaries were killed at Mission Beach by the cyclone. Mission Beach is the best place in Australia for this big bird.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...Cassowary3.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...Cassowary1.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...Cassowary2.jpg
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Butterflies were relatively scarce but I did see a few. One of the more common species on this visit was the Large Green-banded Blue (Danis danis), a gorgeous species. Depending upon the light, its colour varied from turquoise to bottle green.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...andedBlue3.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...andedBlue2.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...andedBlue1.jpg
The Green-banded Blue (Nacaduba cyanea) had similar markings but was much smaller.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...Line-blue1.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...Line-blue2.jpg
I saw Black-spotted Flash (Hypolycaena phorbas) on several occasions.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...tedFlash2a.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...ttedFlash1.jpg
Common Grass Blue (Zizina labradus)
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...h/Zizinia1.jpg
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Skippers are always difficult. I think that these are Greenish Darter (Telicota ancilla) rather than Northern Large Darter (T. ohara) due to the pattern of the underwings.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...shDarter1a.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...ishDarter2.jpg
Darter of some sort (Telicota sp.)
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...h/dartlet4.jpg
I think that the following are Wide-brand Grass-Darts (Suniana sunias):
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...h/dartlet2.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...h/dartlet1.jpg
We found this lovely Jungle Carpet Python (Morelia spilota) on a drive near Mission Beach.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...glePython1.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...glePython3.jpg
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Mission Beach
Brown Tree Snakes (Boiga irregularis) were the most commonly encountered snake near Mission Beach.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...TreeSnake1.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...TreeSnake3.jpg
Litoria jungguy are sexually dimorphic with small yellow males and large brown females. These frogs were common along Lacey Creek.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...iajungguy1.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...iajungguy2.jpg
We also saw a couple of the White-lipped Tree Frogs (Litoria infrafrenata). These are the largest of all tree frogs.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...ippedFrog1.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...ippedFrog2.jpg
Creek Frog (Litoria rheocola)
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...h/Litoria2.jpg
This Striped Possum was looking for insects in a rotting tree.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...pedPossum1.jpg
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Mission Beach
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Nicest shot of a living Nacaduba cyanea i've seen.:grin2:
This sp mimics the poisonous Danis/Psychonotis spp. and forms a mimicry complex with several other unrelated spp. which explains why it's so different and lacks the typical Nacaduba markings.
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The Danis danis is such a beautiful butterfly! Thanks for sharing :)
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David, forgive me but I don't remember... I see many beautiful pictures with a great DOF. Which camera and lens do you use? :)
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Chillagoe
Thanks, guys, and for the interesting info, Antonio. Sometimes I see Small Green-banded Blues as well but did not find any of those mimics on this trip.
Antonio, I use a Canon 40D and Tamron 180mm (butts) or Canon 100mm (night herps). Habitat shots are with a Tamron 18x250.
After Mission Beach, we drove to Chillagoe for a couple of nights. This is an interesting area with lots of limestone outcrops and caves. There were thunderstorms each night.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...e/habitat6.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3.../habitat12.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...e/habitat2.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3.../habitat10.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3.../habitat14.jpg
The surrounding habitat was dry eucalyptus savannah. Large termite mounds were numerous in some area.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...habitat11a.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...e/habitat1.jpg
