Dead in the water

What do you reckon is going on here? All those dead trees beside Thompson Creek at Connewarre.

Every year our group visits this area on our Challenge Bird Count route. There is a small reserve on Dans Road that provides access and shade, the latter most important because some Challenge days have been awfully hot! We have seen some 'good' birds here, and dipped on a lot as well. Yesterday I called in and there was nothing there. Not a thing. So it gave me the chance to really look at the creek. Thompson Creek is only short and here it only has a kilometre or two to run before it runs out the sea at Point Impossible - if there's enough water to breach the sandbar. I haven't been to the Point for a while so maybe it's closed and the water backing upstream is brackish or too salty for the trees that used to grow on the banks.

And while I'm on the subject of 'nothing to be seen' let me just say that there is nothing in the bush either. I spent some time in the forest north of Anglesea earlier in the day looking for autumn orchids, and hardly heard a bird. The long drought, climate change, feral cats, lack of insects or flowering trees - something or everything is causing the numbers of birds to drop.

PS Are you happy now Stephan? (He, my b-i-l, was complaining that I hadn't blogged for a while. Maybe he should start his own.)