Etty Bay August 2026

We rented a car and drove to Etty Bay on the Cassowary Coast for staying a night at the campsite, where there's a strong possibility that we'd encounter a Southern Cassowary.

And there it came! It was suddenly just there. 

How fascinating!!

It was slowly walking around the beach and the campsite, ignoring all the fuss around it. 

You would notice the crowd moving along with the bird first, rather than the bird itself.

I wouldn't like the idea of bumping into one in the dark...😱

Look at its legs and feet!!

The signs are everywhere on the campsite and the beach, asking campers not to leave food out in the open, 

and yet, some people don't care...!😠

Cairns August 2026 VI

Michaelmas Cay is one of the biggest seabird colonies in Australia and even in August, a so-called winter month, this little sandy island was packed with them.

The number of the boats and people, which can get to the cay, is restricted per day and you can land only in a small patch marked by a rope and signs.

Once on land, the birds are so close! 

Brown booby

a precious egg!

Sooty terns

Sooty terns and Crested terns

The black bodies with white speckles are young sooty terns, the black body with a white head in the middle is an adult Common noddy.

a young Sooty tern

Sooty tern & Common noddy

a Great frigatebird (I think)

Silver gull, Pied oystercatcher and Crested terns

a lot of Silver gulls

An unattended egg can become an easy snack for gulls.

During the peak season, there will be 20,000 pairs of breeding birds on this cay! Can you imagine that!

Cairns August 2026 V

We went round to the adjacent cemetery as well.

Lots of Rainbow bee-eaters were flying around. 

Straw-necked ibis 

We saw many honeyeaters and our first Double-eyed fig-parrots in the trees in the cemetery but there's no picture of them 😔

Back in the Botanic Gardens 🌳

Sahul sunbird

Leaden flycatcher

Green oriole (Yellow oriole)

Torresian imperial pigeon

Little pied cormorant

Radjah shelduck

Cairns August 2026 IV

The Cairns Botanic Gardens is a popular place for both the locals and the tourists with all sorts of purposes - jogging, BBQing, walking and of course nature-watching. 

↓ The official info by the Cairns Regional Council

the cairns botanic gardens

Freshwater lake

Pacific black duck

Comb-crested jacana

You can fly!!👍😍

pretending it was a moorhen😆

Kreftt's turtle

Australasian darter

Saltwater creek

Australian brush turkey

Orange-footed scrub fowl sunbathing (ant-bathing?) in the open

Black butcherbird

Sulphur-crested cockatoo