Alex – Page 4 – Alex McDowell's Photo Gallery

This week’s creatures – 16 December 2019 – Blue Gropers and Wolf Spiders

Alex mount cootha, scuba diving 2019-Dec-17blue groper, groper, kookaburra, wolf spider

We have had some great diving in the last week and have also seen some feeding birds on Mount Cootha.

Blue Groper at Julian Rocks

The fattest fish in the sea!

Cod at Julian Rocks

Moray eel at Julian Rocks

Kookaburra on Mount Cootha

Kookaburras on Mount Cootha

Wolf spider eating an innocent victim

This week’s creatures – 30 November 2019 – Bandy Bandy snake! Barking Owl!

Alex Echidnas, Owls, Scorpions, Weekly updates 2019-Nov-302019-Dec-03bandy, bandy bandy, barking, barking owl, scorpion

It’s been very dry this week, so we have been filling the water pots on the hill. We’ve seen a couple of unusual creatures!

Scorpion on Mount Cootha

This is the Barking Owl. It's quieter and a little smaller than the Powerful Owl and is absolutely beautiful.

Echidna rolled up into ball on Mount Cootha

Check out the hair on this creature. We ended up giving it a drink from the Camelbak, cause it's so dry at the moment.

Bandy Bandy snake on Mount Cootha

This guy wrinkles his body up above the ground to show it's bigger. It was actually incredibly thirsty so we put some water into a bottle cap, which it happily drank from.

This week’s creatures – 15 November 2019 – the Mighty Housebull!

Alex farm 2019-Nov-152019-Dec-03bull, cattle, cow, cows, housebull, proserpine, yestin

We have been out on the farm in Proserpine this week. It was an awesome amount of fun and great to see the cows in action!

Cows on the farm eating from the trough

This is the housebull. Next time you think your cat / dog / goldfish /gerbil is pretty cool, remember that it is no match for the awesomeness of the housebull.

This is Millicent, the farm chicken. We had to chase her out of the bedroom. She was annoyed.

Magpie on a fence post

These wedge-tailed eagles were flying over the farms at Proserpine

These cows are usually hand fed and very friendly

This week’s creatures – 7 November 2019 – Koala!

Alex koala, Scorpions 2019-Nov-072019-Dec-03drought, dry, koala, powerful owl

It’s been exceptionally dry on the mountain this week. So we took a pot up the hill and fill it with water each night. Last night when we were filling it, we found a koala watching us. It’s a pretty rare sight to see – these guys don’t usually show themselves to humans.

This is the wolf spider mother, carrying her babies around. We see quite a few of them at this time of year.

We have filled a pot with water on the mountain, because it's so dry. We were filling the pot with a camelbak and saw this guy watching us. (It's definitely a guy.)

Powerful Owl on Mount Cootha - watching us from a branch

The scorpions are on the move.

This Week’s Creatures – 23 October – Dancing turtles!

Alex scuba diving 2019-Oct-232019-Dec-03byron bay, dive, diving, julian rocks, reef shark

I went to Byron Bay for a dive at Julian Rocks. The water was approximately 10 metres visibility and still a little cold (by Byron standards – 20 degrees.) There’s a lot to see there with dancing turtles and the odd shark.

weekly_20191019_082356_Olympus_E-M5MarkII_8.0mm_1160_5.6_250_FlashOnFired-scaledGREENTURTLE

Green turtle at the Nursery, Julian Rocks

weekly_20191121_222906_Olympus_E-M5MarkII_60.0mm_180_9.0_200_FlashOnFiredBIRDSTRIKE

This bird swam down and pecked me in the head. It was chasing fish and went for my bubbles (or maybe... it was aiming for my head.)

weekly_20191012_105922_Olympus_E-M5MarkII_8.0mm_1160_9.0_250_FlashOnFired-scaledTURTLECOMINGFROMSURFACE

Green turtle descends from the surface at Julian Rocks

weekly_20191012_102505_Olympus_E-M5MarkII_8.0mm_1160_4.0_250_FlashOnFired-scaledBLUEGROPER

Blue Groper at Julian Rocks

weekly_20191019_075817_Olympus_E-M5MarkII_8.0mm_1100_6.3_250_FlashOnFired-scaledKINGFISH

This Kingfish is hunting at Julian Rocks. It's fast and hungry.

weekly_20191019_082129_Olympus_E-M5MarkII_8.0mm_1100_8.0_250_FlashOnFiredREEFSHARK

The Byron Reef shark hides at this spot in the sand. It's not bothered by divers.

weekly_20191012_074553_Olympus_E-M5MarkII_8.0mm_1160_8.0_320_FlashOnFired-scaledROCKCOD

Rock Cod at Julian Rocks

weekly_20191012_082955_Olympus_E-M5MarkII_8.0mm_1160_7.1_320_FlashOnFired-scaledDANCINGTURTLES

Dancing turtles in the shallows at Julian Rocks

This week’s creatures: 7 October 2019 – the McDowell Python

Alex mount cootha, Owls 2019-Oct-082019-Dec-03mount cootha, powerful owl

Some of the amazing things we see on Mount Cootha. The snake is a Morelia siplota mcdowelli – McDowell’s Carpet Python.

This is the McDowell Python. It's actually called a McDowell python

This Bandicoot hops like a kangaroo but is much smaller - about the size of a cat. It eats ants with its snout.

Powerful owl on a branch

Small Eyed Snake on a log in the forest