12/02/2024
Hi everyone!
We are now officially back from our wet season Kutini-Payamu (Iron Range) National Park Wildlife tours in the Cape York Peninsula. We are really excited to tell you about our highly successful season!
We thought we would provide a bit of a tour report of our time up there to show and tell you what we saw in our epic 38 day stay with 3 fabulous groups of talented, fun and excited guests!
As per, usual we arrived before guests to get the lay of the land. Every year is different up in Iron Range so despite knowing the area very well we like to spend some time checking areas out that have proved fruitful in the past along with looking for new sites that may have potential. This includes trying to locate all the wildlife specialties that we know guests want!
The first week was incredibly dry and we received next to no rain!
WET SEASON, WHERE ARE YOU??!!
This proved somewhat difficult with a lot of birds deciding they were to wait for rains to begin nesting. However, it was very good for reptiles who took advantage of drier conditions with holy grail species such as Varanus doreanus (Blue-tailed Monitor) being seen 7 times! We also had a lot of luck with other smaller monitor species like Canopy and Spotted Tree Monitors.
Most endemic birds were located albeit the Yellow-legged Flyrobins, were a little quiet. Amphibians were on the quiet side due to weather but we managed to locate the desirable Litoria eucnemis (Fringed Tree Frog) and a few other species only found in the Cape without much issue. Other highlights included Hoskins Ringtail Gecko, Cape York Rock-wallaby and the northern subspecies of Australian Masked Owl.
Sightings of target mammals such as the two Cuscus species were also few and far between due to dry conditions. Heavily fruiting mango trees through the park, did not help either as they had more choice in where to go and spread us thin.
The two main reasons our guests join us every year is the two Ps! The King of the Cape, the Palm Cockatoo and of course, the migratory species Papuan Pitta! Palmies proved a little elusive as some of their favourite feed trees were derelict of fruit but the Pittas were calling up a storm despite the lack of rain.
We were very confident in a successful tour season and welcomed our first group! A really special group of people and a first for us as 2 of the 3 were wildlife artists. So instead of looking for the perfect photo, they were to illustrate it in the field!
During our 9 days we truly witnessed some special animals. In regard to birds, we tried our butts off for close Palm Cockatoo encounters but really struggled for a good 7 days until we had 3 birds checking out some feed trees finally. We were rewarded with very close views! We also had an incredible encounter with one of our Papuan Pittas who decided he wanted to sit and call in front of us (without bird hides) for 5 minutes! We managed to locate all but two of the endemics (Yellow-legged Flyrobin & Black-winged Monarch) during this time. Northern Scrub-Robin was also very vocal and provided good views (They have been great for us the past few years). Conditions were not favourable despite lack of not trying. Other specialities like Buff-breasted Paradise Kingfisher were seen but were not calling intensely like they have in the past and the Cape York subspecies of Yellow-breasted Boatbill were also quite vocal.
Raptor species were also in good numbers with 7 species seen so far including Brown Goshawk, Collared Sparrowhawk, White-bellied Sea Eagle, Eastern Osprey, Brahminy Kite, Grey Goshawk and Whistling Kites seen almost daily.
RAIN WHERE ARE YOU?!
It came for a day or two and this bought us some of cute endemic frogs like Litoria bella and L. eucnemis again. Thanks to the wet this gave us one of the most incredible events we have ever seen and that was a diurnal spawning event of Litoria bella (Cape York Graceful Tree Frog). We were able to document this and found out that this had not been seen before (We will share a separate post on this later). We were also able to locate one single juvenile Green Tree Python on the first night of the tour which put us in good stead! Adult Greens were up and down in numbers during our nights ranging from up to a dozen to just one or two some evenings!
Mammals were a bit thin on the ground due to the drier week but we did manage to get onto a few usual suspects as the rain hit towards the end. Cape York Melomys, Agile Wallabies, Giant White-tailed Rats, Spectacled Flying Foxes and Bare-backed Fruit-Bats were seen regularly after a little bit of rain hit. However, one of the more exciting sightings was the potential Spectacled Hare-wallaby that was seen roadside one evening. Unfortunately no photos were taken so we can't positively ID it but behaviour and appearance points towards one.
We also had two sightings of Northern Bettong, in a similar location to where we have seem them in previous years. We shall endeavour to photograph them one time, it is always difficult when driving though!!
Whilst our tours are known for animals, we do also check out iconic flora species and took time to look for our favourite, the carnivorous pitcher plants! A real favourite of guests old and new!
Our last few days were spent re-visiting some of the species our guests wanted to get better views of and in doing so connected us with our short but sweet viewing of an adult Southern Cassowary! For those that are unaware, Kutini is the word for Cassowary in this region!
As our first groups tour came to an end, a storm front approached which looked like cancelling their flights home but it passed and we said goodbye! A great start to our tour season!
We had a few days off and decided to locate the extremely hard to access Kutini Boulder Frog. We were lucky to receive a good amount of afternoon rain and set off in search of this little beastie. This requires one of the most difficult walks we have ever done to access the area for them. After about 1.5 hours of walking we had moved 400m into an almost impassable location of the park to hear the calls of our target! We located 2 frogs within 20m of each other and heard multiple others. A few quick photos and back down we went. Mission accomplished!
Our second group had a true wet season arrival with torrential rain and strong wind gusts as soon as they got off the plane. With 3 new excited guests, we decided to go out for an afternoon drive in the rain where the guests got their first views of Palm Cockatoos whistling and displaying in the rain as well as some dingo sightings. With all of this wet weather we knew our first night had to be spent looking for snakes and frogs! We had great opportunities with a number of frog species (including the sought after endemics) and the group got to see their first Green Tree Pythons!
Over the next few days we had mixed weather, raining one minute and stinking hot the next, providing us with humidity levels up to 99% at times! We managed to tick off most of the endemics over the coming days however the Yellow-legged Flyrobin was not to be seen or heard (not for a lack of trying!), thankfully we did get views of Black-winged Monarch with group 2. We had fantastic opportunities with Buff-breasted Paradise Kingfisher, Yellow-billed Kingfisher, White-faced Robin and Eclectus Parrots. A very obliging Frill-necked Monarch gave us great views as it sat in front of us and preened for over 10 minutes and this is where we also had views of a very vocal male Magnificent Riflebird, which one of our guests managed to snap an incredible photo of. Other endemics such as the Black-eared Catbird, Chestnut-breasted Cuckoo and Red-cheeked Parrot gave us distant views and photo ops.
A pair of Marbled Frogmouths put on a great show one night using different vocalisations to communicate with each other, including a Cane Toad-like call from the male and a soft cooing response from the female. Another spectacular experience was watching Great and Lesser Frigatebirds in their hundreds at Portland Roads one afternoon.
Some of group 2's reptile highlights included a number of Spotted Tree Monitors, Yellow-spotted Monitors, Frill-necked Lizards, a baby Saltwater Crocodile, Water Pythons, Scrub Pythons (from a fresh hatchling to a 3m+ individual!), both adult and juvenile Green Tree Pythons, and the greatest sighting of all, a Blue-tailed Monitor!!
After a re-scheduled flight and some bonus days added to their tour, group 2 said goodbye and we welcomed our third and final group.
Group 3 had the most challenging conditions of all - dry, hot, and windy! However, we put in the hard yards and managed to tick off most of the endemics within the first few days of the trip. We had great opportunities with Palm Cockatoo, Eclectus Parrot, Yellow-billed Kingfisher, Northern Scrub-Robin, Yellow-legged Flyrobin (FINALLY!), Fawn-breasted Bowerbird, Red-cheeked Parrot, Marshall's Fig-Parrot, and the most incredible views of Papuan Pitta! Trumpet Manucodes had us chasing them around in circles in the dense rainforest, however we did manage several views of them. Tawny-breasted Honeyeater, Graceful Honeyeater, and Green-backed Honeyeaters provided some good photo opportunities, as did the ever-frustrating Tropical Scrubwrens for those who were fast enough! The only endemic that manage to elude group 3 was the Black-winged Monarch.
Group 3 had less monitor and dragon sightings and more skink sightings, with many sightings of Major Skinks and Blue-tongued Skinks. However, we did have some great views of Yellow-spotted Monitors and a very obliging Canopy Monitor.
One very exciting sighting for group 3 was two juvenile Rufous Owls (ssp. meesi)! A fantastic bonus sighting after we had stopped to view a juvenile Green Tree Python.
The lack of rain and strong winds made it challenging to look for frogs some evenings, however we managed to see all of the usual suspects apart from the Cape York Graceful Tree Frog which needs a decent downpour before they start calling. Another wonderful bonus sighting was a Black-headed Python we came across on our very last night.
There were no delays for our final departure which also included Jazz saying her goodbye to Kutini-Payamu for the wet. We all boarded the plane and headed back home with some great memories and some new friends!
We hope you have enjoyed our trip report! We have included some images we were able to take during our time before tours started, in between groups and during some down time between guiding sessions!
If you'd like to ask about our Kutini-Payamu wet season tours, or any of our other tours, please drop us a line! We'd love to show you why we are simply the best in the Cape!
