Evergreen shrub or small tree. Grows 1 – 6 m high.

Leaves

Bright yellow-green to dark green and paler underneath. They are 4 – 15 cm long and 1 – 3 cm wide, and generally have a toothed or curved edge. The leaves have a minty smell when crushed.

Flowers

Funnel-shaped and white, or pink to pale mauve, with purple and orange spots inside. They are about 2 cm long and grow in clusters at the end of branches. They are slightly scented.

Medium marine snails (molluscs) that float around in the open ocean. They have a purple shell that lightens in colour as you move towards the flattened top of the shell. The shell itself is very light weight and they have no operculum (lid). Their flesh is a dark purple or sometime black.

They float around the open oceans upside down, attached to a raft of mucus bubbles that they make.

Size

Up to 30 mm

Miscanthus sp.

Wael Ken grows in clumps and is reed or cane like in form. It reproduces underground through its root system, which sends out shoots that grow upwards. It is used as a traditional building material. The cane can also be used to drink kava once the pith is removed.

Leaves

Leaf sheaths are either free from hair (smooth) or covered in long soft hairs. The leave blades are flat and linear and 18-75 cm long. They have a prominent mid-rib. The leaf margins are sharp with slight serrations.

Flowers

Flower plumes grow from 0.3-2 m or more in height. Flowers are comprised of loose branching cluster with large fan shaped branches 10-40 cm in length. The flowers are purplish. These flower clusters persist through winter.

Flower-like invertebrate that has many long tentacles surrounding a central mouthpart which is attached to a hard surface. These specialised fighting tentacles come from the acontia, which appear as white spots on the top of the column. At low tide or when disturbed, the tentacles retract and the anemone looks like a round blob of jelly. They range in colour from bright red, reddish-brown to dark purple.

Their tentacles contain hundreds of stinging cells called ‘nematocysts’ which the anemone uses to sting and immobilize their prey, and to do battle with other unrelated anemones. These are the same cells that give Blue Bottles their sting although most anemone species cannot penetrate human skin.

Metallic blue-black on top and light to dark grey on its breast and belly. Its forehead, throat and upper breast are rust in colour. It has grey legs and feet, and its eyes and bill are black. A young Welcome Swallow has shorter tail feathers than an adult and its forehead and throat are a creamy beige (instead of rust).

Distinctive feature

A deeply forked tail with a white band or row of spots on the long tail feathers.

ClimateWatch was developed by Earthwatch Australia with the Bureau of Meteorology and University of Melbourne to understand how changes in temperature and rainfall are affecting the seasonal behaviour of Australia's plants and animals. The first continental phenology project in the Southern Hemisphere, ClimateWatch enables every Australian to be involved in collecting and recording data that will help shape the country’s scientific response to climate change.

The motorbike frog is a ground-dwelling tree frog found in Southwest Australia. It gets its name from the male frog's mating call, which sounds like a motorbike riding past and changing gears. Other common names are Moore's frog, the western bell frog, western green and golden bell frog, and western green tree frog.

Back varies from pale brown to dark chocolate with areas of deep green or olive, red colouration in the groin and hind limbs.

Tadpoles

Large, black with deep tail fins.

Phenology is the study of periodic plant and animal life cycle events and how these are influenced by seasonal and interannual variations in climate. Examples include bird nesting, insect hatching, plant flowering and fruit ripening. Many studies have already provided insight into the relationship between climate variables, such as temperature and rainfall, to the timing of these phenophases.

Climate change is affecting rainfall and temperature across Australia, and is consequently triggering changes in established flowering times, breeding cycles and migration movements and other phenological changes of our flora and fauna.

Monitoring phenology is important as changes can impact entire biological communities, our food sources and our health. Unfortunately. few significant datasets have been collected and researched in Australia and the Southern Hemisphere. That's where ClimateWatch comes in and enables everyone to contribute to critical climate change research.

A large bird of prey with a dark grey back and a white head, white chest and white belly. Their legs are also white and have long black talons. They have dark eyes and a light-coloured, hooked beak. When viewed in flight, the undersides of the wings are a distinctive half white and half grey-brown.

First-year juveniles have a buffish and ‘spiky’ head, contrasting with patchy cream and dark brown body and wings; underwing pattern also patchy, but note half-moon at base of tail feathers. Older juveniles have a pale buff-grey tail.

Their nests are massive, made of sticks and branches, usually found in a tall living tree near water or on a remote coastal cliff (on ground if on an island).

Distinctive feature

A wedge-shaped tail, distinctive when seen in flight.

The White-browed Scrubwren is a small, drab bird which inhabits the dense undergrowth in many different habitats. The male has a blackish mask; cream eye; white eyebrow and bold curving silver-white whisker-mark; rufous rump; and a variable dark tail band. The female is duller and her whisker-mark is browner.

Distinctive feature

White-brow and curving silvery whisker-mark.

Mostly light blue-grey in colour. The forehead, crown, chin and upper throat are white. It has a long, slim neck and a pointed grey-black bill. The legs are long and dull yellow in colour. Easily identifiable when seen from below with the dark flight feathers of the wing contrasting with the paler grey plumage.

Males and females are similar. When breeding, the birds have long feathers (nuptial plumes) on the head, neck and back. Young are similar in appearance to non-breeding adults, with little to no white on the face; underparts often have a reddish colour.

Distinctive feature

Its characteristic white face.

A ground-dwelling tree frog found in Southwest Australia. It gets its name from the male frog's mating call, which sounds like a motorbike riding past and changing gears. Other common names are Moore's frog, the western bell frog, western green and golden bell frog, and western green tree frog.

Ranges from bright green to olive to pale brown, and it can change colour depending on the local temperature and environment. It has a white (occasionally pinkish) stripe on the back of each leg that runs down to its toes, and its belly is white.

Size

11 – 14 cm

Wickham is a modern Pilbara mining town serving the port at Cape Lambert.

It is named after John Clements Wickham, 1st lieutenant on HMS Beagle 1831-36 (Darwin's expedition), and later government resident at Moreton Bay, Queensland.

A shrub or small spindly tree. Grows 1 - 4 m tall.

Leaves

Simple 2.5 - 9 cm long and 2.5 - 5.5 cm wide. They are distinctively pruinose (frosted in appearance) and the leaf margins are serrated and prickly.

Flowers

Cream, yellow or red irregular flowers. They are mainly red in the Pilbara region.

Erect shrub or tree, 3 - 10 m in height, but can grow up to 20 m.

Leaves

Phyllodes (flattened leaf stems) are narrow (5 - 12 mm wide) and 5 - 17 cm long. They have a prominent central vein and a curved pointed tip.

Flowers

Pale yellow or white, and clustered in groups of 15 - 30 inflorescences. Flowers form globular balls.

At the southernmost tip of mainland Australia, Wilsons Promontory National Park offers spectacular scenery of huge granite mountains, open forest, rainforest, sweeping beaches and coastlines.

The ClimateWatch trail at the Prom is located on the Lilly Pilly link track. It is a short five minute walk from the Tidal River Visitor Centre to the signpost marking the starting point. The track is 900m long and can be accessible for all via a motorised Trailrider, allowing people of all abilities and ages to discover a wonderful sample of environments rich in birdlife, such as estuarine wetlands, lowland forest and heathlands.