Last night we went to MacDonald  National Park to see if we could film, in spite of the park being closed to the public following the passage of ex-cyclone Oswald. The gravel path near the entrance was washed away and debris littered the ground. The going was most unsteady, so we abandoned our quest after walking about 150 metres. We agreed to try Palm Grove, having already accessed The Knoll and Joalah after the storm. It too was closed, but we ducked under the tape and kept walking. There appeared to be no damage to the path. After a while we saw an exquisite green moth hanging from a twig. Hugh and I went back to the car to get my camera while Mark stayed with the moth, which I duly filmed on my return. We continued on our way, encountering several pademelons which were too elusive for me to film.

My worst premonition was confirmed when we saw the vast bulk of perhaps the mountain’s grandest tree, the leaning Moreton Bay Fig, blocking the path. Tragically it had been uprooted by Oswald. Today, I returned to film it and pay it homage. The tree had… Read Complete Text

Tonight was our 80^th shoot. It did not disappoint. Though I normally don’t film fungi at night, I filmed one with a large, dark grey cap, a cluster of 3 enormous Giant Panda Snails feasting on some orange fungi, a roosting Large-billed Scrubwren and a beetle. Note that on the previous week’s shoot we were joined by Jaap who is spending a couple of weeks in Canungra before resuming his bus travels around Australia. It was great seeing him again.

A friend phoned to tell me about a cereus cactus in her garden that only flowers on one night a year. All but one bloom had flowered. I filmed the plant in daylight to set the scene and returned after dark and filmed the remaining bloom in all its flowering magnificence. I also filmed a cricket, a katydid and a small moth on the spent blooms.

For the second night shoot in succession, I filmed a butterfly resting with wings spread. Normally we see moths at night. We were in Joalah and encountered an unconscionable number of leeches in spite of fairly dry weather. Recent rain had not even muddied the ground. It was as if the leeches still thought they were enjoying the good, flooding season of recent years. This meant that my helpers Dan and Jason, whose young eyes are better able to discover potential subjects than mine or Mark’s, were more taken up with picking off leeches than spotting creatures, though I did film a Leaf-tailed Gecko completely minus tail.

We started our night filming last season on 29 September. The shoot was notable because I filmed Red Triangle Slugs for the only time. Tonight, we started the new season in Joalah an incredible 6 weeks later than last year. Besides my trip to Longreach and the cool weather, the unavailability of one or other of the crew, compounded this season’s rocky start. Tonight’s haul was a female Harvestman, an earth worm, a skink, an eel, and,  a male Trapdoor Spider, not lurking in its burrow, but, unusually, on the prowl.

My camera’s 20x optical zoom is invaluable for revealing the appearance of a given subject. It works best if I am 90 cm or a metre away. But, some subjects, like the small and tiny moths I filmed on the garage today, can benefit from bringing the camera as close as possible to them. One of its features is the button which allows a zoom at a pre-set slow or fast speed, but which can also be pressed to give very gradual increments of proximity. I was able to get much better close ups of the moths this way than by being on full zoom.

For the first time I failed to film any subject on our fist night shoot of the season. Mark, Dan and I were in the Knoll NP. The shoot was already delayed because of a cool Spring and further delayed because I was in Longreach for the first half of October. But the generally cool nights persisted. Returning from Steve’s the night before, the external temperature read-out in my car was C13° and it was 14° before we started our walk tonight. The only times, twice from memory, when I failed to film on a night shoot was on the last walk of the season. Tonight we saw a rodent which didn’t hang around to be filmed, a Ring-tail Possum which was too far away, a small moth buffeted by the wind, a Brown Huntsman spider and in the car park just before leaving, we heard an unfamiliar sound and Dan shone his powerful torch on a Squirrel Glider climbing high up on the trunk of a Flooded gum tree and jumping onto branches in the canopy with incredible speed and agility. I was content just to have seen this glider for the first time ever.

I started my current tape on the 9 May. Apart from being away, I have been tied up working on Supplements 4 to 6 and only resumed filming on 27 July. Since when my time has been taken up with matching subject content to tapes and DVDs for the State Library and getting work on the website underway. Pardon the preliminary, but today I filmed a Lace Monitor at The Knoll and Lawyer Vine, a climbing palm whose stems can form tangled clumps of 20 to 100 metre long canes. The palm is also and aptly known as Wait-awhile. If you brush aginst a cane, your instinct is to pull yourself free, but the spines dig in when you do so, which can be immensely painful on bare flesh. The answer is to stay put for a moment and the cane releases its grip.

Night filming 72 with Mark and Hugh, the last of the season as the nights are now rather cool and fauna activity decidedly less. Nonetheless, towards the end of our walk I filmed a moth that wasn’t a Granny’s Cloak, a spider that wasn’t a Brown Huntsman and the unexpected highlight, a Dwarf Crown snake which was at Mark’s feet when he first noticed it.

Night filming 70 at the Knoll National Park, with Mark, Dan & Jenny. I filmed a cricket grooming, a native cockroach, a Damsel fly and, for the one and only time, mating Stick insects.