Owl hunting

It's been either too hot or too wet to have been doing too much recently although I did get back into Gordon's Bay the other day for a first snorkel in a long long time. 46C in Sydney a couple of weeks back and with the remnants of Cyclone Oswald blowing through over the past week or so, we've had a lot of rain too. A bit of excitement among the birding community though as the cyclone has blown a load of tropical species south onto the NSW coast. I've seen most of them up north over the years and as I don't have a state list I've not paid them too much attention. Instead I've been after the owls! Last weekend we attempted to find the Sooty Owl up in the Blue Mountains but the place was dead. There weren't even any possums about which usually pop up everywhere when you get a spotlight out into the bush.

Barking Owl (please take my word for it!)

However, Warriewood Wetlands, the location of repeated recent failure in hunting the Black Bittern, finally came through with a Barking Owl #442. Another nocturnal tick. Bonus!