Some people are surprised at this, but lyrebirds are actually quite common in the forested slopes of the Dividing Range, in the Plenty's headwaters. The best spot in our area is Coombs Rd - if you park at the bottom gate (see the site details), you can often hear several as soon as you get out of the car. Best time is mornings during winter and early spring, when the males are practising hard - often from perches in trees - or displaying on their mounds. The females (pictured) are also quite vocal, but less given to showing off. Kinglake National Park is another good place to find them.

Not only do lyrebirds have their own rich, mellifluous songs, but they are superb mimics. If you listen to a busy male you'll hear a dozen species copied in quick succession. Listen carefully, and you'll hear that the imitations are too good to be true - richer than the original species, as well as being run together in rapid succession.

Lyrebirds are very vulnerable to habitat loss and disturbance, and predation from cats and foxes. However they seem to be holding on in good numbers in the ranges. Ours are at the western end of their distribution, which extends right through the high country and Gippsland, and up the east coast into Queensland.

Often called 'Snake-birds' from their habit of swimming with only head and neck showing above the water, darters are often seen along the river, where they fish in the pools. You'll most often see them sitting on a log with wings outstretched, drying off - to help them submerge they allow their plumage to become saturated and so less buoyant.

Unlike their relatives the cormorants, which catch fish with their hooked beaks, darters usually spear their prey with their dagger-like bills. This means that they need to toss the fish in the air and catch them in order to swallow, which they do whole - they can manage suprisingly large fish in this way.

Adult males are all black, and females have white bellies - this is a young bird still with spots. Their backs and wings are beautifully marked with a gold-on-black pattern. It's impossible not to think of dragons when you see them!

Our smallest bird, the weebill can produce an astonishing volume of sound from its tiny body!

Very helpfully, in one of its several calls it calls out its name - you usually hear them before seeing them. They're often hard to see as they forage in the foliage, being not much larger than the average gumleaf, but their habit of hovering while plucking tiny invertebrates from the leaves is a good clue.

This one is collecting gossamer for its nest. They're numerous in the park - you will often hear half a dozen or more calling at once. They're often to be found foraging in mixed flocks with thornbills, pardalotes, honeyeaters and fantails.

These majestic raptors breed in our area and can often be seen soaring over the Park and nearby farmland. Young birds are relatively light-coloured, old birds nearly black.

They are mainly carrion-feeders, but also take small mammals such as rabbits. Thier eyesight is much more acute than ours, enabling them to spot prey from a great height. Once airborne they rarely flap their wings, but rely on rising columns of air in thermals to provide lift. The diamond-shaped tail is diagnostic.

Thier nests are huge stick constructions, high in trees, that may be used for years.

All of our cuckoos are migrants (with the proviso that a few birds, mostly juveniles, may overwinter) - they head for Queensland and PNG for the colder months. When they return in early spring they're keen to mate, and you'll hear them calling up and down the gorge. By far the most common is this species. Its descending trill is distinctive and carries over long distances.

These cuckoos are brood parasites, laying their eggs in the nests of much smaller hosts - scrubwrens, fairy-wrens and thornbills. This leads to the ludicrous sight of a tiny foster-parent struggling to keep up with the incessant demands of its much larger step-chick.

Gang-gangs are everyone's favourite, with their kind-looking faces, punk crests and squeaky barn-door calls. They seem to be more or less resident in the gorge, although they are constantly on the move, chasing berries and seeds. Typically, once they find a good food source they become quite careless of observers and will tolerate a closer approach than many other species. Introduced hawthorn and boxthorn berries are a favourite food.

Females are all grey, males have a bright red head - this is a young male, with an incomplete hood. Like many of the parrot family they are strongly pair-bonded and mate for life. They're often seen in small groups feeding or creaking their way across the canopy.

It seems incredible that a bird could do everything it needs to - feed, preeen, communicate, fly - with a bill like this, but I guess they've had a lot of practice. In fact the bill is ideal for the side-to-side motion they use to sieve the mud on the bottom of the pond, looking for yabbies, shellfish and worms. It's fascinating to watch!

Spoonbills, like their relatives herons and egrets, prefer water they can wade in, so they're often found in Morang and Wilton Vale wetlands. They're nomadic, following the food, so they will appear from nowhere, stay a few days, then be gone again. At the moment numbers in our area are down, as inland Australia has had so much rain that the food supplies are everywhere. They'll breed up and return to the coast as the inland dries out.

Yellow-bills are often found with their very elegant cousins, the Royal Spoonbills, with thier handsome black bills and flowing plumes.

These beautiful songsters (both male and female sing) are year-round residents, unlike the Rufous Whistler, which heads north in winter. They have a variety of calls, rich and melodious.

This is the male; females are grey, with characteristic rufous edges to the primaries, visible as a series of lines in the folded wings. They are hunters of the middle-level foliage, taking invertebrates from bark and leaves in wooded areas. Newly-fledged birds are quite rufous and can be tricky to identify.