Little to report and photographically deficient


I'm writing this a day or two early as we are currently stuck in Port Moresby airport waiting for a delayed flight home. Just as our flight was due to be boarding the announcement came that it would be delayed by nearly 3 hours. Sadly the two little cafes had shut for the night a few minutes earlier.

We've had a very quiet couple of weeks and I don't think I even have a photo for you. I'll make an effort before I post this. Work has been routine with me reviewing papers people want to publish and polishing my training presentation before I rehearse it with a few local colleagues on Monday. The only excitement was this overnight trip to Port Moresby. We are getting close to relaunching the two old journals and my boss (Laurie) wanted to have a preparation meeting with some people in PM so we flew Thursday morning and stayed at the Sanctuary Hotel near the airport. We got to drive to some new bits of PM so that was interesting. Otherwise it was one long meeting and a couple of short visits. NARI has an insect collection and chem labs in town and a research station (Laloki) on the northern outskirts. All three facilities need lots of love.

An example of the unpredictable nature of life in PNG: There's a university at Goroka and last week there was an altercation between some students and local lads. The police intervened and stopped things getting too out of hand but threats were made and the university decided they couldn't guarantee the safety of the resident students. The uni year has been cancelled and all students are to return to their home towns. Our local MP organised for 20 buses to drive up to Goroka to fetch back the Lae students. What will happen next year?

I have managed to see some good birds recently. A lifer yesterday was an Ivory-billed Coucal at Laloki. Today there was a Fawn-breasted Bowerbird hanging around the hotel carpark. There were Pacific Black Duck and Masked Lapwings at the Lae airport yesterday morning. I'm seeing some breeding activity at work. The main interest is a Torresian Imperial Pigeon sitting on a nest high in a coconut palm. It is obviously an adult and it seems to have a dark bill. This reinforces my theory that the TIPs around Lae are different to the ones in southern PNG and Australia. I need to get some photographic evidence. In the next coconut palm along the driveway there is a pair of Yellow-faced Mynas building a nest.

This weekend (if we ever get home) we have a lunch to meet new volunteer Juliet and farewell departing Ringisai. Juliet will live in town with her partner Sam who arrived with us. Next Thursday I'll be back in PM for the day to help present the two journals to representatives of all the interested parties. Then we are off to New Britain for a few days R&R. Then it won't be long until we head to Brisbane for our Sunshine Coast holiday with our kids and grand-daughter. I don't really want to think past that really.

Looking forward to the test cricket so hopefully our TV will have it on one channel at least. We are still on reduced channels as we wait for a replacement Digicel box (5 weeks now). We are really reduced to ABC International and BBC World News as the other 20 odd channels mostly show garbage, soccer or rugby. We used to be able to get several ABC channels, SBS and Channel 7 so it was much more useful.

I took a photo for you:


Update: Sunday 16th Nov.

A new bird for the house area yesterday was a Pesquet's Parrot. Google it to see why it was once called Vulturine Parrot.

Jenny found this cool beetle in the pool this morning. It seemed Ok once it dried out. I put a couple of photos on iNaturalist but the best I can do so far is call it a type of Round-necked Longhorn Beetle.


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