An ancient cassowary approaches through an even more ancient rainforest

Walking along a little rainforest trail, fallen leaves crunch under foot and the Wompoo Fruit Doves calls are heard over the sounds of insects. You’d be forgiven if you thought you had somehow fallen into a time vacuum and travelled back in time some 100 million years.

This is tropical North Queensland’s Daintree Rainforest. The oldest and most ancient rainforest in the world. It’s been dated to be over 180 million years old, which is about 10 million years older than the largest rainforest on the planet, the Amazon Rainforest.

The Daintree is a part of the wet tropics of Queensland, an area that stretches some 450kms along Queensland’s north east coast. Covering almost one million hectares, it is one of the most biodiverse places on the planet and home to many endangered species. It is an evolutionary textbook with relict Gondwanan rainforest that covered much of Australia and Antarctica a 100 million years ago. To me it was somewhere I had always wanted to explore and I finally ticked that off the bucket list.

I had travelled here with another conservationist and photographer, Blane Edwards from earth offline, to find some of the wildlife that calls this ancient rainforest home. We were really nervous as it’s difficult to spot wildlife in the jungle at the best of times,

But luck would be on our side and we had some incredible wildlife encounters.

I had just taken dad to the Cairns airport so he could catch a flight back to Adelaide and Blane had just landed an hour before. We did a quick switch and we were soon on our way to the Daintree Rainforest. Blane is new to photography and he was keen to use his new camera in the field. We didn’t have to wait long because in the distance we saw a massive colony of fruit bats landing in some eucalyptus trees in a creek line. These bats are very important to a healthy rainforest as they eat all kinds of different fruits. As they fly, they go to the bathroom. That bat guano helps the seeds germinate and these bats can move seeds great distances. We were able to get some nice shots of them as they stared down at us with their cute little faces.

After being on the road for about two hours we arrived at the Daintree ferry. This ferry connects people to the northern parts of the area and to Cape Tribulation. It controls the number of visitors heading into the National Park. The Douglas Shire Council has proposed a bridge be built to connect the two. This would increase vehicle traffic and could be a serious concern to the resident wildlife in particular the cassowaries. Also, I really liked the ferry trip, it’s an old fashion way to travel across the river to this old fashion rainforest.

We got to the accommodation after dark and on arrival we were greeted to a little brown tree snake. Perched in the roof above my bed, it was probably hunting little frogs or geckos in the roof. I picked him up and moved back into the trees outside where he belongs. The sounds of the rainforest were echoing through the night. We were lucky enough to be staying at Halfcut’s stunning eco lodge, the Benella Rainforest Reserve. I can’t thank them enough for allowing us to stay there and for their amazing work they do to preserve the Daintree Rainforest.

The next morning, we were up with the sun and headed to the Jindalba Rainforest Walk. You can do this trail on your own and takes around 3three hours to complete. We had only just begun the walk when out of the greenness of the rainforest a large black figure approached us, walking along the same trail we were. This animal looks like a dinosaur that had somehow managed to survive the asteroid. In fact it is very closely related to the dinosaurs, as birds are their closest living relative.

The southern cassowary is the most iconic species to walk this rainforest. With its black hair like feathers, dinosaur looking feet, its bright blue neck and red wattles this bird stands 1.8 metres tall and is labelled as the most aggressive bird in the world.

This gorgeous female cassowary most certainly wasn’t that. She calmly moved between us, picking up fruits that had fallen on the floor and occasionally looking up to check us out. It was an incredible experience to be able to share space with this amazing animal. She eventually moved off and we continued our walk. You couldn’t wipe the smile off my face.

A female cassowary cruising through the rainforest

In the hot afternoon sun, we explored some of the beaches and went to Cape Tribulation for lunch. The next walk we did was the Dubuji Boardwalk. This takes you through the rainforests and mangroves. Close to the beach we were lucky enough to find a male cassowary in the distance. With him he had his two little chicks following his every move. We had enough distance between us that he was very relaxed and even laid down so his chicks could hide under his plumage in safety. In the cassowary world it is the dad who incubates and raises the chicks. The female only lays the eggs and then goes about her days as nothing happened. This male did run around a bit and looked a little stressed at times but we soon realised it was because there were lace monitors around. These two-metre-long lizards would take one of the chicks and dad wasn’t taking any chances.

That night we had signed up to do a night walk with Jungle Escapes.

When we arrived Ian, who runs the walks, said there were two Bennett’s tree kangaroos on the property that afternoon. As we moved through the darkness with our spotlights in hand, we all scanned the trees to catch a glimpse of eyeshine which would reveal the tree roos hiding spot.

Along the way we found some different species of frogs and a very small bird perched on a tiny branch. They do this so they can sleep in relative safety as the branch will move and wake the birds up. It wasn’t long before we hit the jackpot. Ian spotted not one, not two but three Bennett’s tree kangaroos, high up in the canopy. There could have possibly been a fourth as well. We had a clear view of one of them as he just sat on the branch and watched us intently. The female and her joey were hiding further up in the tree and we only got a glimpse of her back. The male at the front soon became so relaxed he went back to eating. They eat a wide variety of rainforest leaves and fruits.

The elusive Bennetts Tree Kangaroo watches the group inquisitively

The Bennett’s tree kangaroos are relatively hard to find. They are only found in a small 70km stretch of land south of Cooktown and north from the Daintree River.

We were beside ourselves. What an incredible moment to spend time with an animal not many people get to see or even know exist for that matter. Australia has only two species of tree kangaroo, the other 12 are found on the island of New Guinea. They are found in mountains areas and also lowland forest. It was a perfect way to end the day.

The next day I had organised for us to go out onto the Daintree River with the amazing team from Solar Whisper. If you follow their social media pages, you’ll see they love an animal that not too many do. An animal that causes such a divide among the community and one of the reasons I decided to relocate up to North Queensland.

The Australian saltwater crocodile is the apex predator in this river system. Once hunted almost to extinction for its skin and sport, it became protected in the 1970s.

Numbers have increased in the Northern Territory that they are basically back at pre hunting numbers. In Queensland however, the numbers are still quite low, but are increasing.

David the tour operator and local croc expert didn’t take long to find the first croc of the tour. It wasn’t a monster, but a tiny baby from last year’s clutch of eggs. Baby crocs are much like the bigger ones, they hunt and eat anything they can over power. So one this size would mostly feed on small fish and water insects.

Baby saltwater crocodile waiting in the shallows

As we moved off the main river and up a small creek the crocs got a little bigger. A female was resting on the bank, mouth ajar for thermoregulation, but she was calm and posed nicely for photos. She was one of a few resident females in this stretch of river. After finding her next on the list was the big boy, the dominate male croc. We continued along the creek and David went about telling the guests about the history of the crocodile, the area and about the importance of the ecosystem. As well as pointing out small birds like the sunbird, azure kingfisher and a Brahminy kite. We were even lucky enough to see a kill on the river as the kite swooped down onto the bank and snatched up a large white lipped green tree frog.

As we headed back out onto the main river, we were about to go past what we thought was a log but at the last second it ducked under the water. It was only shallow and it revealed the full outline of a massive croc.

This was the big boy, his name was Scarface and he soon resurfaced showing off his massive head and back. They do this to intimidate, to show how big they are and to not mess with them.

He was a really impressive crocodile. We followed along as he causally swam down the creek towards the female we had seen earlier. It was a really educational experience, and everyone enjoyed the cruise. David has done a wonderful job and anyone in the area should definitely check them out and meet the resident crocodiles.

Just like that the trip was over. The next day I took Blane back to the airport. I could not believe how lucky we were with our wildlife sightings. Unfortunately, no big scrub pythons but I’ll be back to try and find them another time.

If you’d like to stay at the Benella Nature reserve you can book on their Facebook page www.facebook.com/benellarainforest it is managed by the rainforest trust Australia as well so your stay will protect the Daintree rainforest.

If you’d like to support the amazing team at Halfcut and find out more about their amazing work they do protecting the Daintree rainforest visit their website www.halfcut.org. You can donate or go half cut yourself and be a part of the movement. In 2020 alone they have raised over $342,000 and protected 137,000 square metres of Daintree rainforest. The work they do is incredible so please check them out!

If you’d like to go on either the solar whisper or jungle escapes tours visit www.solarwhisper.com and www.jungleescapes.com.au

Exploring The Ancient Rainforest Of North Queensland