by Paula Peeters | Jan 26, 2016 | Forest portraits, Wildlife illustration
Freshwater National Park smells burnt, but it looks lush green. I can hear the sleepy chortles of lorikeets, somewhere up in the bloodwoods. It’s late afternoon, on a hot January day. Maybe they’ve had too much sun, or too much nectar, or both. Scribbly gums rise like...
by Paula Peeters | Dec 17, 2015 | Tales of science, Wildlife illustration
I was sitting on a nearly-deserted Bribie Island beach last week, with only sand, sea, and bushland all around. An osprey was hunting nearby, and a few terns drifted past. The tide was up, and we’d just been for a dip – but only as far as a shallow sand spit,...
by Paula Peeters | Sep 17, 2015 | Writing
I’ve just spent more than a week living in a eucalypt woodland in central Queensland. For 8 days I saw no concrete, no bitumen. I didn’t check the internet, or watch any TV. I slept in a tent pitched on pale orange sand, with native grass tussocks all around, dried to...
by Paula Peeters | Aug 27, 2015 | Tales of science, Wildlife illustration
This is Fleay’s barred frog, one of several species of large frog in the genus Mixophyes that occur in or near streams associated with Australian wet forests. Now when you look at a frog, you might think that it’s a short-lived, rather ephemeral...
by Paula Peeters | Aug 26, 2015 | Forest portraits, Wildlife illustration
I explored my first rainforests when I was 14 years old and the experience probably changed my life. On a cold autumn morning at Binna Burra, I awaited the dawn bird walk, an enormous pair of very unsophisticated binoculars slung around my neck. Dingoes were howling...
