AFRO408 - thankyou so much for the pictures and story. One of these years, Tracy and I MUST visit.

In the picture, the grey coloured birds look like our Blue Heron - fish eating birds, while the white ones look similar but white like Egrets. Perhaps they are male and female, or perhaps adult and juvenile? What are they called in Australia?
The chest feathers from Heron are/were/are used for tying salmon and steelhead 'spey' flies. In some areas it is illegal to possess them and died and burned (just the barbules) chicken feathers are used.