EXPLORING ABANDONED OUTBACK AUSTRALIA IN SEARCH OF REPTILES _ HERPING SOUTH AUSTRALIA EP6

Welcome back guys and have a look at this. Beautiful bright red desert sand. Proper red outback sand. We decided to leave Wayala. We've driven three hours north up through Port Augusta and into Rocksby Downs. Now there's a few different species we're going to be looking for around here. We want the smooth knob-tailed gecko, I want to see another mulger, I want strap-snouted brown, western brown. There's still so many things we need to tick off the list. There's even pygmy mulger monitors around here. Varanus gillini. That's another fly down the gob. And yeah, Varanus gillini, that would be a huge, huge tick off our list. But how is this? This is the first time I've been on this red outback dirt. We're pretty much almost in the centre of Australia here. The red centre. And this is just, this is just unworldly. This is beautiful. There'd be so many species out here, not just reptiles. You've got little marsupials, little mammals, birds. It's just, yeah, super keen to see what we're going to find out here in the outback of Rocksby Downs. So it is a bit windy to Sarvo. I don't know if that's sort of pushing our luck away with reptiles, if they're staying underground, hiding from the wind. So we thought we'd come for about a 25 minute drive north west, I don't know, away from Rocksby, northeast or east of Rocksby Downs, away from it anyway, to Andamooka. So it looks like this is an old opal mining town. So I don't know what it's going to look like. It's going to be a bit like Lightning Ridge. This is the sign on the way in. Interesting choice for the outback. It could just be because of the colours in the opal. Who knows? You got a sign of the town there. I'll show you this drawing actually, it's pretty cool. It's like a little cartoony map of the town. Welcome to Andamooka. So yeah, going off that, I'm sort of getting some weird vibes. I don't know what to expect from down there. It's nearly five o'clock, so none of the shops, or if there even are any, are going to be open. But we'll head down, give you guys a little bit of a look, explore the area a little bit. Hopefully this wind bug is off and the reptiles start popping up. So as you can see, oh this is a cool little shot to film this. Oh the indigenous fella's caught himself a snake there, he's got a boomerang. So yeah, as you can see, a very very stark contrast to where we just were. Very very rocky habitat compared to 20 minutes back where we just had all that beautiful red dirt. It's not abandoned, but there are a lot of abandoned and empty houses. Like look at this thing here. Old opal mining town. Dare say some people maybe still live here. Maybe not hustling and bustling like it was back in the day. It reminds me sort of up at Lightning Ridge, around that sort of area. Very spread out, lots of dirt and rock everywhere that have been pulled out of the ground, and a lot of abandoned homes. So here we are, Albertone's house. It was first begun in 1931 at the time of the first discoveries of opal in Andamooka. So there you go, that gives you a bit of a date and time around when they sort of started building here. And this is obviously some old heritage house, but even still looks like 70s, 80s, 90s houses here are completely empty. Oh my god, you can go in this thing. Super creepy. Old bed. Let's get out of here. It's easier to have more room in his workshop than in his house. All righty, we'll probably head back to Roxby now, grab ourselves a feed, get ready to head out on dusk, hopefully in the hunt for some reptiles. Hey guys, so we've just started our road cruising for the night and we've already cruised upon our first two animals. Not one, but two air-beaked geckos. One's giving me a little present actually. There we are. Oh, they're both giving me presents. Two air basin beaked geckos. One a lot larger than the other one. What we might do, we might let the little fella go, and then we'll have a look at the big daddy. Off you go, buddy. So here is a new species, not only for the trip, but a new species for me. The air basin beaked gecko. And what a cool little dude. He's got awesome patternings down him. You can see how his colours with the mottled whites and oranges and reds really blends in with sort of the rocks and the sandy ground. Just like all of our native geckos. Perfect, perfect camouflage. And you can see the shape of their nose there, the shape of the snout. You can see why they are called the beaked gecko. And he's actually very, very long and slender. Very long tail, original tail too. This is actually only the second species of this genus I have seen before. Up around Bourke, I've seen the eastern beaked gecko. So very, very cool to tick off another species in this genus. And what lucky little dudes being able to live in this stunning, untouched habitat. And away you go, my little friend. So guys, hopefully you can see me, but it has been a long cold drive of a night. It's been like a few hours since we'd last seen our two beaked geckos. And I've finally, finally found another species. And it's a species I've never seen before. And it is a little tiny species of lorista. You can see his tiny, tiny little eye there. And this dude is tiny. I don't know how I even spotted him. Have a look at that. So this is in the lorista genus, otherwise known as a slider. This is in the same genus as the one I saw duck away when we were in O'Leary. Obviously a different species. This is not something I really know much about, so I can't tell you too much. I know they'll sort of disappear in under these soils and sand. It actually looks like he's got no front legs. It doesn't look like he's got front legs, but he's got these teeny, teeny, tiny little back legs here, which would help propel him along the ground or through the dirt. Very interesting patterns, which help him just disappear in the scrub here, in the sand and amongst the bushes. Look at that. What an incredible, incredible little dude. I'm gonna be foraging through my book to try and find out what this little ripper is. Alrighty, we'll send our little mate off here, and I reckon he might bury under the sand. Let's have a look. Off you go, little fella. And there he goes. Never to be seen again. How cool. Now hopefully we can get another one or two things for you. The temperature's dropped very quickly, as you can see. I've got a jumper on. It's pretty gross, to be honest, but yeah, let's see if we can pull anything else off. And our fourth beaked gecko for the night. We had a third, but we didn't film it. And our fourth. We can't seem to get another gecko, but we got these little beaked geckos everywhere. It's a very pretty looking individual. Actually, the oranges are popping compared to the two we got earlier in the night. Have a look at that. That's absolute cracker. All right, keep going, buddy. So we're still out here walking through this red dirt, trying to find our nod-tailed gecko, our nepharis levis. Still no luck, but we have ticked another new species off the list for the night. And have a look at this dude. So he's got quite similar markings to our beaked geckos that we've been seeing, which does make sense because they're living in the same habitat. Still got those pale creams. The two lines with the oranges and the black down the back are absolutely beautiful. He's got a little V pattern on his head too, which actually the beaked geckos had a similar V pattern on the head as well. Good size gecko too, actually. He's a bit bigger than the beaked geckos we've seen. And again, guys, the close-ups on our geckos. Look at the scalations there. Our little fingers, the scales up the arms, on the head, and those two lines of oranges and blacks and pale whites and creams. These geckos are just absolutely stunning. Original tail too, does not get much better. New species ticked off the list. And the eyes, the gecko's eyes, you just can never, ever get over those. Unbeatable, incredible. I love them. So our little mate here was running towards these shrubs to get away from us, so we'll send him back in. And there he goes. You wouldn't spot him if they'd sat still, I swear. He's gone. Already can't see him. How cool is that? Guys, so every time you're out in the scrub, you find a bearded dragon or an agamid, a dragon of some sort doing the weirdest thing, sleeping in the weirdest places. Just like our beardie the other night, our little baby that was sleeping in the middle of the road. Except we now, we have a huge adult central bearded dragon. He's very, very yellow. He's asleep in the middle of the road. We will try and get closer to him. Hopefully he doesn't bail. There he is. He's just watching me. And I'm getting a video of him now, because his eyes are open and he is getting ready to make a move. And there he is, guys. Finally, sixth or seventh day of the trip. And we have got our hands on a large adult central bearded dragon, Pagona vitticeps. Honestly, they do the weirdest things. Every trip I've gone on, I find a bearded dragon sleeping in the middle of the road. I've found earless dragons sleeping in the middle of the road. You dudes just do some dumb, dumb things. No wonder you get run over. But how about the colors? Look at the blues, the splotches of blues in his back there. The yellows, he's a very, very yellow individual. Guessing probably a girl. Have a look underneath. Yep, female bearded dragon. You silly girl, what are you doing? Dumb, dumb. So, we got our big beautiful female bearded dragon off the road. So, anyone who doesn't know a whole heap about these lizards, I'm sure most people do, but they're called the bearded dragon because they've got this nice big beard and they'll puff that right up underneath. They'll make it black as well as they fill up their body with air. She is doing that at the moment, but she's a little bit sleepy to put on the rest of the show. These guys, they do tend to sleep in trees a lot and that is going to be a safer, better spot for her to sleep rather than on the roads. We've already been this way and we didn't even see her sleeping. They blend in quite well. So, hopefully I'll put it up in this tree. That way up there, she's going to be safe from predators. No mulga snake's going to come take her off the ground. No fox, no cat and no truck or car is going to get her on the road. So, there she is, much better. Alrighty, there you go girly. You're safe now. Go back to sleep. You're a very pretty girl, very beautiful. How cool is that? She's even going a little bit higher now. She is loving it. Sweet dreams baby girl. You have been an absolute pleasure. You keep sitting on your throne and we'll see you another day. Stay safe. How cool is that? So guys, we're back out here this morning in this beautiful red dirt. So, we had a little bit of success last night, but not much of what we wanted. We didn't get any snakes. We didn't get the knob-tailed gecko we're after, but we did tick off a couple of new species. We got the air base and bait gecko, also the lorista and that sleevy beardie right at the end. Just walking through the red dirt trying to get some dragons, trying to get something that we've not seen much of. There's different species of dragons around here. We still haven't seen a shingleback yet. We really, really want Varanus gillini, the pygmy mulga monitor, but whether we get that, that's hard strung. We really, really need perfect, perfect habitat for that, but we're just not having much luck at all. We haven't seen anything this morning. Just like last night, we didn't get too much. The temps just dropped so quickly. I mean, the reptiles out here, especially at night time, they're probably used to the 30 to 35 degree nights where it was 22 to 23. Last night, we were going to stay here again tonight, but just with the success rate, we'll probably start heading back east towards Sydney. Hopefully, we can find some more stuff here. If not, we'll see you guys along the way on the trip back home. So, I need to find a spot like this for the gillini with the mulga trees. We need the trees which have all the nooks and crannies in them. We need the hollows. This sort of bunch here doesn't seem to have the hollows because they love to live in the hollows of these trees under the loose bark. This bunch here just isn't looking to go, and I don't know if I have the patience or the time to hang around looking for the right patch. Had a little dragon run under my feet, but it disappeared, but yeah, that's about it so far. So, I've just come to another patch. This is more what the lizard prefers. You got the loose bark, and they can get in under all that and hide. That stuff's sort of perfect. This really would be what they like. These particular trees, I'm not a tree person. I'm not a plant expert. I don't know if these are the exact mulga trees that they do live in, but that's looking more like it. Unfortunately, still no hollows. I know, oh, I'm getting stabbed by anything and everything. I know they really like the trees with the hollows and the loose bark because that just gives them extra coverage, but please, also, if you ever do come out looking for anything like this, what do they say? Leave nothing but footprints. Take nothing but photos. Don't go pulling bark off these trees and ruining habitat. If you do that, the animals, they no longer have anywhere to live, and they won't survive. It's exactly like if you go flipping rocks looking for snakes, you want to put that rock back exactly how you left it. For example, you got snakes like the broad-headed snakes. There's been studies. They'll only go under rocks that are in the perfect position with the perfect gaps with the perfect temperatures, and if you go and mess with that, you've just taken away habitat for the endangered broad-headed snakes. So, you definitely do not want to be doing anything like that when you're going out and looking for reptiles at all, but you guys know my luck. I know my luck. I probably won't get a gill. We haven't even gotten anything else. A little dragon ducked through my feet, but that's about it. So, here we are. I'm going to get you guys all excited, and I'm not going to find anything. I know it. I don't have all the time in the world to keep going all day because we are going to be heading back towards home, but this is more like it. So, you can see this old tree starting to get our hollows. So, these are the right trees. You've got the hollows, a little gillen eye, little gillens monitor, a fly out there, fly back in. He's got all the little bark he can get in under, and these guys love to eat their spiders, bugs, invertebrates. Another little hole there. Stuff like this would be perfect. They'd have to be around here somewhere. I'm thinking we're definitely in the right spot now because I just stuck my nose and my light down there. There is poo and scraps and whatnot in there, and it literally smells like reptile. It smells like dirty reptile enclosure. So, there's definitely something living in there. If it's not gillen eye, there is some kind of reptile living in and around this tree, which means we might be getting close. So, we're heading from Roxbury Downs back to Port Augusta, and I've just sort of pinpointed some spots along the way that we can stop. This is looking pretty promising. Nice mulga trees. You've got holes, holes, hollows. You've actually got a bird hollow in here. There's a nest. You probably can't see the GoPro, but there's a nest with an egg in there. That's pretty cool. Keep stopping, keep poking around, working our way back east. Now, have a look at the colors on this guy in the sun. Aren't they just phenomenal lizards? The sand monitor, Varanus ghouli. Very, very underrated, just because they are so common, but stunning, stunning little animals. His adorable little hands there. Oh, poor little tucker, but at least we got him off the road. We can put him in the bushes for something to eat. That way, he won't be wasted. He won't die in vain. Something can eat him. Bigger sand monitor, scavenger, a bird. We'll just put you in there, buddy. Adorable, adorable little dude. There's sort of an idea of the size of him, but yeah, something will scoff him up rather than him just getting squashed and beaten down into the road. That's not doing any one of his favors. It's harsh out here. So guys, these Arvo temps are perfect. It's cooling down. We're a little bit lower than 30. I think it's about 27 degrees and it's perfect, perfect temp for snakes to be cruising around in the afternoon and have a look at this. This is what we want. This is what we want to see. Snakes. Remember we share the air with snakes. That's what we want. Back in the old girl. No luck. This is looking to be a disappointing trip home. We're still traveling through the outback. We're going to head up through Cobo and whatnot. Lots of red dirt, lots of shinglebacks, lots of dragons, lots of sand monitors, but go to this road. Don't know how we're going to go. Probably won't even go out tonight. It's already dropped like buggery and it's windy and it's not the greatest habitat around here. So we'll probably have an early night head back out tomorrow and we need to find some more reptiles for you guys to finish off this trip. And finally another reptile, a big bearded dragon. We'll see if he's going to stay still at all, but he is keeping an eye on me. He's probably going to run. Away he goes. There's a car coming. Not going to move. Just got the car back off the road there. He was a big boy. Big, beautiful yellow beardy. Don't know where he's stopped now. Lucky we came around when we did because look at that car truck. He would have been smushed. He would have been a pancake. Look at this big truck. Ready? And flattened. What's going on with the hair? He ran into here. I'd say he's probably got a burrow somewhere or he's hiding looking at me and laughing. But yeah, that is the first reptile we've bloody seen for ages. I thought I wasn't even going to get one for you for this episode. If this even is its own episode. At this stage I'm looking like a trip home is going to be tacked on the back of bloody Rocks Me Downs video. But I'm going to chuck a whiz. We're going to jump back in the car and keep on pedaling towards Cobar. And that wraps up our South Australia trip. And what a trip that was. We found a good range of species considering the time of year we went. If I could ask a small favor for you guys, the channel's been struggling lately. The engagement and the growth hasn't been as strong as it normally is. If you could leave a like, a comment, a share and subscribe, if you haven't already, that would just mean the world. I've got some brilliant stuff lined up, heaps of stuff already filmed, ready to go. And I want to share this message with as many people as possible. Cheers guys. And I'll see you next week.