Wildlife Watching in Australia

Last weekend we enjoyed an extra long weekend at a holiday house in Busselton with my wife, 2 kids and my mom-in-law.

It started well from a wildlife point of view, as I parked outside our house to collect the keys I saw a new species of skink – southwest cool skink.

Southwest cool skink @ Busselton

Southwest cool skink @ Busselton

Later that afternoon we discovered we had a resident King skink pair that slept behind a plant pot just on our front porch and spent the late afternoon sunning itself there – not sure where they spent the rest of the day but we did see one in the back garden.  They were very camera shy and the kids also wanting to see didn’t help me!

King’s skink @ Busselton

Sienna trying to see it!

We also had quite a few bobtails out and about – we had a pair being friendly in the garden just next to the carport.

That night we took advantage of my mom-in-law babysitting our baby and my wife, Liam and I went to the possum trail I have blogged about before – see blog for directions.  We kitted up with headtorches, cameras and mozzie repellent.

We didn’t see possums straight away – our first sighting was this spider and pair of tawny frogmouth.

Tawny frogmouth pair

Liam was having a great time looking for critters in all places like this hollow log.  He did say he saw bears!

We then saw our first Western ringtail possums – all up about 15 that night.

Western ringtail possum @ Busselton

Western ringtail possum @ Busselton

Western ringtail possum @ Busselton

…..then followed by some roos.

And some brushtail possums – they look quite different from the ringtails – especially the ears.

Common brushtail possum @ Busselton

Common brushtail possum @ Busselton

The last possum sighting of the night was this cute mum & bub which completed our night out very nicely.

On one of the days we took the train out to the end of the Busselton Jetty – one of the longest wooden jetties in the southern hemisphere – over a mile!  At the end of the jetty they have built an observatory in approx 8m of water.  I have dived the jetty before in the past but was keen to show the family.

Liam enjoying the marine life

Mel & Sienna having a great time.

We had a lovely time seeing heaps of marine life – Liam proudly pointing out a dead crab which he said was asleep on its back!  We all really enjoyed the observatory – while not a cheap thing to do – it was good to experience while on holiday and you are supporting the upkeep of the jetty.

We had a lovely relaxing holiday – I got to see plenty of wildlife and better yet show my kids!