# Broken Hill Herp'n



## Nephrurus (Apr 23, 2010)

I recently headed out to Broken Hill for a friend's wedding, but I took the opportunity to go out and do a bit of herping while I was at it. 

Going with some mates out to see the sculptures in the Living Desert NP. While we were there it was pleasantly clear and warm and a few herps came out to bask. 



We found an Earless Dragon _Tympanocryptis tetraporophora_ on the walk up to the sculptures. 







Tree Skinks _Egernia striolata_ were also about and clearly don't read books. They were sheltering and basking on rocks. 






Big Central Bearded Dragons _Pogona vitticeps_ (and some little ones) were out sunning themselves as well. Big and fat, they'd clearly benefited from the huge numbers of locusts out in that neck of the woods. 







on the way back I spotted this monster basking and I was very excited to see this Stoke's Skink _Egernia stokesii_. 







More photos of each species can be seen on my Pbase site. 


We also saw some very fat Curl Snakes _Suta suta_ on the road on the way out to broken hill, and some very fat dead eastern brown snakes on the road on the way back home. 

Everything is in amazing condition out that way at the moment. It's well worth a trip to see massive expanses of water and endless plant growth. Next spring should be pretty exciting. 


-Henry


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## levis04 (Apr 23, 2010)

Great photos neph as always.


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## zulu (Apr 23, 2010)

*re Broken*

Interesting henry,seems like there will be fluctuating numbers of animals in general with all the water and food,good to see.


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## Origamislice (Apr 23, 2010)

i love brocken hill, one of my grandparents is curently living there and both my parents and my other set off grandparents used to live there. good to hear its in good condition!


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## Slats (Apr 23, 2010)

Great photos!!


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## Sock Puppet (Apr 23, 2010)

Nephrurus said:


> on the way back I spotted this monster basking and I was very excited to see this Stoke's Skink _Egernia stokesii_.
> -Henry


Sounds like you were pretty stoked to see that, Henry


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## moloch05 (Apr 24, 2010)

Nice, Henry. Did you venture out at night? It is a good place for geckos.

A trip next spring should be interesting.

Regards,
David


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## Nephrurus (Apr 24, 2010)

Very nice Sock Puppet, I love a good pun, especially a scientific-name related one. 

I didn't manage to get out at night as I really had no time for herping and temps were pretty low (although on the night of the wedding ti would have been perfect!). I did find some tesselated geckos around Nyngan as well as an assortment of frogs (I'll post them later on) but it was pretty cool. I think next spring will be a great time for a trip out to just about anywhere in western NSW or Qld. 

-H


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## jordo (Apr 24, 2010)

Nice pics. Tree skink looks a bit different to what I'm used to, have to get up there one day.


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## Acrochordus (Apr 24, 2010)

Great photo's and report, Do you shoot in RAW?
Thanks Tim.


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## Nephrurus (Apr 24, 2010)

Jordo, i thoughthey might be saxatilus at first until I remembered they don't occur anywhere near that area. 
I have photos of striolata from Culgoa NP (NE of Bourke) that look completely different. 

Always in raw Tim, the I process with light room, leaving all the raw files unmodified to be stashed away on a couple of external harddrives. If they need furthur work I use photoshop although usually i can't be bothered. Mainly i use PS with bird photos to reduce noise in the background and sharpen the subject.


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## Nephrurus (Apr 24, 2010)

Kicking around Nyngan at night on the way back home, I managed to find a few frogs hopping about on the road at night. 

By far and away the most common frog on the road was juvenile green tree frogs _Litoria caerulea_. 

I probably saw a thousand on the road, intermigled with Naked Treefrog _Lit. rubella_ and Emerald-spotted Treefrog _Lit. peroni_.

I did however spot a few neat critters though. 

Southern Holy-cross Frog are a really cool critter that is always a treat to see as they are seldom above the ground very long. I found a few juveniles and a single adult. The juvies looked like little ping pong balls bouncing across the ground. 

Less evident were the juvenile salmon striped frog _Limnodynastes salmini_. Little brown frogs on the road all looked the same. 

L.rubella





L. salmini





N. bennetti






Again, theres more photos of each of these species on my pbase site (see my signature). 

-H


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## greeny1 (Apr 24, 2010)

wow, those pics are awesome!!! we are organising a trip out to camerons corner and cant wait, love the western NSW district, alot of differant secies compared to the coast, looks like you had an awesome trip.
thanks mark


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## Nephrurus (Apr 24, 2010)

Ah western NSW is a poor mans western QLD. Camerons corner should be pretty good though, especially after the rains they've been having. Make sure you take your torch and do some searching for geckos. You should be able to find some nice ones out there. 

-H


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## TNWJackson (Apr 24, 2010)

Very cool. I shall definitely have to get out that way in the not too distant future (Spring sounds good!).


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## Acrochordus (Apr 25, 2010)

Thanks for that Henry!!!
Tim


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## Nephrurus (Apr 26, 2010)

Here are a few bird photos I took while I was out at Nyngan in the caravan park there. There are some very comfortable cabins that are surrounded by birds. 

Spotted Bowerbird





Australian Ringneck Parrot





Red Winged Parrot






Zebra Finch





Red-rumped Parrot





Brown Treecreeper


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## H.bitorquatus (Apr 26, 2010)

Nice shots, love the earless dragon shot! some of those bird shots look very sharp, are you using a tripod for all the birds? Would be annoying lugging it around I would think.


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## TNWJackson (Apr 27, 2010)

Those are some lovely bird photos. What sort of lens are you using?


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## Nephrurus (Apr 30, 2010)

I don't actually own a tripod. I should get one though. 

At the moment I own the very old and slow Nikon 80-400mm VR lens. I bought it on ebay for less than half it's RRP.
It focus is very slow and can be tempermental. You need very good light to be able to use this lens without a tripod. This is why most of my PNG photos were quite dodgey. 

If i was to buy more camera gear I'd probably buy a 70-200mm VRII with a 2x tele converter or spend alot more and get a 300 2.8 VR with a 2x teleconverter. 


Henry


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## angelrose (Apr 30, 2010)

oh wow, what amazing pictures, you are really talented!
Thank you so much!


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## AUSHERP (May 5, 2010)

thats awesome man. where abouts in broken hill did you go? we were there for 4 days but all we could
find was vittis and netteds!!!! not complaining it was a great trip but a gidgee would have been nice!


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## moosenoose (May 5, 2010)

Love the little Crucifix toad  Great piccies!!


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## Bax155 (May 5, 2010)

Started the thread of well with the earless!! my favourite shot out of the lot, thanks for sharing!!


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