'Birdman' Gary enjoys a bush camp during his 55,000km trip

FORMER school principal-turned caravanner and photographer Gary Oliver has claimed a new world record. Gary and wife Glenda, from Victoria, have just completed a year-long, 55,000km odyssey touring Australia in their Jayco caravan, during which Gary photographed a staggering 518 wild birds, the most ever captured photographically within 12 months. Birds Australia, has now recognised him as the record holder. "It was our personal challenge," the triumphant travellers confessed to Caravanning News. "A bit 'nerdy' - even crazy perhaps - but for us it was an adventure that would take us to most parts of our great country and give us a special focus when we visited so many special places."

Birdman's new feather in cap

By GARY OLIVER
Have your say

My wife Glenda and I began our journey on September 1, 2010.

Research suggested there was only one person who had claimed a total for a 12-month period; his name was Drew Fulton, an American student who had been given a special grant to "photograph the endemic birds of Australia", which he had completed between July 2006 and July 2007.

His total was 377 different species, a number that I was confident I could match, albeit my photography would be a mad 'birds on the run' thing and not so much an artistic pursuit.

With Glenda as tactician, navigator and support person we headed north a week late due to floods in our home town of Carisbrook.

Being spring it was great for birds and the breaking of the drought meant that birds were everywhere enjoying a bumper year.

Glenda with their much-travelled rig

We drove a Ford Territory and pulled a Sterling caravan so most of our accommodation needs were in caravan parks or free camps.

This was great because it allowed us to stay out in the bush where the birds are and to meet fellow birding enthusiasts and get local advice on the way.

The first part of our trip took us up through the west of NSW and Queensland to Lawn Hill, across to Cairns and up to Weipa and Cape York. Then it was down the east coast, stopping at tropical and subtropical rainforests until we reached the Murray River.

We arrived back at our home in January, just in time for the major floods which damaged 80 percent of the homes in town. This put us back for some time but we managed to circumnavigate Tasmania during February.

It was here that we broke the initial record when I photographed the forty-spot Pardalote, bird number 378.

We still had six and a half months to go so our goal now was to see just how many more birds we could get.

In March we went east to Mallacoota, north to Canberra and then west along the Murray. From here it was north through the Flinders Ranges, down to Whyalla in South Australia then up to Alice Springs, the Barkly Tablelands and the Gulf of Carpentaria east of Kakadu.

Darwin came and went and we moved steadily across The Top to Broome and down through the centre-west of WA to Freemantle.

Finally, after exploring the south-west of that great state, we moved across the Nullarbor.

Our last day of the challenge was spent driving from Waikerie to Pinnaroo on Wednesday, August 31, a year after we began.

It’s been fantastic! Every day was an adventure and we've had a few that will stay vivid for a long time.

My photographs aren’t all brilliant.

Indeed, some look a bit like fuzzy road kills but I put the better ones on our blog site if only to reassure myself that my work was improving.

Gary sees eye to eye with the albatross

Some, like that of an albatross, were very rewarding if only to justify the discomfort involved.

In this case I was on a boat a long way off the Tasmanian coast. I hadn't been sea sick in 40 years but I made up for it on that day as we were hammered by gale force winds that sprung up late in the morning.

The albatross came by and made eye contact with me just as I was about to stop shooting and start throwing up again!

Just north of Cue in remote WA I managed to photograph the Grey Honeyeater.

This bird is our least known honeyeater and when I posted a photo of one on the internet it caused quite a stir in the bird watching world.

I photographed my 518th bird species at the Gluepot Reserve north of Waikerie on August 31.

The bird was a Scarlet-chested Parrot, another rarely seen nor photographed bird in the wild. It seemed a fitting end to an enormous trip.

Statistically we travelled over 50,000km and travelled across every state.

I took over 25,000 photographs on the way to this new record, replaced six tyres and spent a week in both Alice Springs and Broome waiting for repairs and parts for our vehicle to be shipped up.

We received enormous support from friends and family and met some outrageous people on the way.

I kept a blog of our journey going while we were away and I hope it is of interest not just to bird watchers and photographers but to fellow caravanners and travellers who might like to see a trip around Australia with a different perspective.

Please visit our blog at www.birdshootaustralia.blogspot.com and drop us a line.

BACK TO CARAVANNING NEWS MAIN PAGE