As the sun rises over Kama Nature Reserve, Belconnen, a treecreeper's shrill cry cuts through the swoosh of commuters' cars on William Hovell Drive heading for the city.
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''Hear that?'' says Chris Davey who is up to his knees in grass wet from dew. ''That's what we're after.''
He takes a forked stick to extend a mist net near fallen logs in the reserve, creating pockets to catch any bird that hits its fine span.
In late 1989 only 12 brown treecreepers were estimated to be living in the reserve. In 2005 Mr Davey, Canberra Ornithologists Group president, began surveying the area and reckoned 12 to 14 treecreepers were in three groups.
Numbers then plummeted to only two, luckily a male and female from the same group.
Mr Davey and COG colleague Mark Clayton banded them in 2006 and believe four of their offspring are unbanded - two born last year and two young this year. ''They teased us all afternoon yesterday,'' he said.
Hardly a breath of wind stirs among scraggly old yellow box and red gum trees which have highly prized nesting hollows.
Kama is an important shelter corridor to the Molonglo River, a patch in dwindling habitat that's making it more difficult for treecreepers to find breeding mates.
Half an hour after raising four mist nets, Mr Clayton finds a common female rufous songlark upside down in one of them which he gently untangles and releases.
With a Department for Environment and Heritage licence to use the nets, they stay close by to free little birds before a kookaburra or currawong swoops on them.
Many hours and days are spent by the nets, as I discovered the night before, ringing Mr Davey's home only to be told by his wife, Dianne: ''It's still daylight, he's with the birds.''
Months before netting, the grey-brown treecreepers are monitored as the two build a comprehensive picture of their movements. Monitoring and recording take decades.
Camping chairs are pulled from their four-wheel drives and unfolded and the two retired CSIRO wildlife research and technical officers keep an ear cocked for treecreepers.
They'll clamp a metal band and two distinguishing coloured bands on their quarry, before re-releasing them.
Mr Davey disappears into the bush and comes back with a red-browed finch in his cotton bag, which he releases.
Mr Clayton, who later releases a dusty wood swallow that's come from afar for breeding, says it's ironic Canberra planners keep the hills and ridges free of housing and move on to the flatter area - a prime space for native birds.
''This is top habitat,'' he says, looking across the clumps of old timber, long grass and busy ants nests. ''When Canberra was surveyed [for residential development] it was regarded as clapped-out sheep paddocks. But nature can come back if you give it a chance.''
As the morning drew on, the two caught one of the unbanded brown treecreepers from last year, a male now known as ''White-White''.
