More Threatened Species

The Major Mitchell’s pink cockatoo has been added to the national threatened species list, as well as the south-eastern hooded robin and the diamond fire tail. The rare red-goshawk and the painted button quail are now officially “endangered”.

The main cause of the decline of woodland bird species is land clearing and habitat degradation.

Professor Martine Maron, a member of the Biodiversity Council, said “Ecologists have been concerned about many of these species for two decades or more... The threatened list is just one glimpse into the broader tragedy of biodiversity decline in Australia – it is the tip of the iceberg. And once species make it onto the list, they rarely recover significantly.”

Ref: Laura Chung, Major Mitchell’s pink cockatoo among new threatened species on growing national list, Sydney Morning Herald, 3 April 2023.

Safe Havens are Temporary

Fenced off safe havens for animals such as bilbies, boodies and stick-nest rats have aided the survival of threatened animals. However these animals cannot survive in the wild because of non-native predators.

Safe havens are necessarily small, as all the feral predators have to be removed and the fences constantly monitored. This means that populations of threatened animals inside the fence are isolated, subject to inbreeding and overpopulation, and are vulnerable to random disasters.

Safe havens are also expensive and challenging to maintain as they require ongoing management and fences can be breached without vigilant surveillance and repair. Havens are therefore reliant on ongoing funding that cannot be guaranteed.

Animals in safe havens are counted when the government decides whether a species is threatened or not, which means that small populations in the wild, outside the safe havens, are no longer protected from mining and development projects. "We cannot simply put our threatened mammals behind fences and consider the job done."

Ref: Katherine Moseby and John Read, Threatened species recover in fenced safe havens. But their safety is only temporary, The Conversation, 28 February 2023.

Ugandan Judge Speaks for Animals

Chief magistrate Gladys Kamasanyu is head of the first wildlife court in Africa, established in 2017 in Uganda. Since its establishment in 2017 in Uganda, she has tried over 1000 cases and convicted more than 600 wildlife traffickers.

"Her example has sent a strong message to poachers. For years, criminals used Uganda as a conduit for trafficking wildlife products from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and South Sudan. Now they think twice before they commit wildlife crime…”

Kamasanyu says “I speak for the animals. I speak for those non-humans who cannot speak. If I don’t speak loudly, I’m not doing a good job.”

Ref: John Agaba, ‘I speak for the animals’: the Ugandan judge who strikes fear into poachers, The Guardian, 4 April 2023.

Parrot Video Calls Help Isolation

Parrots are naturally social birds that tend to live in large flocks so they feel lonely when kept as pets. Pet parrots can suffer psychological problems as a result, "which can manifest as rocking, pacing back and forth, or self-harming behaviours such as feather-plucking."

A team of researchers in the US and UK have found that pet parrots benefited from being able to make video calls to other pet parrots.

"The study, which involved giving the birds a tablet that they could use to make video calls, found that they began to engage in more social behaviour including preening, singing and play...

"The birds first learned to ring a bell and then touch a photo of another bird on the screen of a tablet device to trigger a call to that bird, with the assistance of their owners.”

The pet owners reported huge benefits to the parrots including learning to forage and even to fly by watching other parrots.

Refs: Hannah Devlin, Parrots taught to video call each other become less lonely, finds research, The Guardian, 22 April 2023; Rebecca Kleinberger et al. Birds of a Feather Video-Flock Together: Design and Evaluation of an Agency-Based Parrot-to-Parrot Video-Calling System for Interspecies Ethical Enrichment, CHI ’23, 19 April 2023.

Birds Falling from the Sky

Avian flu is spreading through bird populations around the world.

According to science writer and author, David Quammen, in the New York Times: “Eagles are dropping dead, as are great horned owls and peregrine falcons and pelicans... It’s the worst thing that has happened to wild birds since the pesticide DDT.”

It is difficult to know what is happening to forest birds but seabirds are more visible. Those that nest in large, dense colonies are more vulnerable to the spread of disease.

Over 50 million birds have died in 37 countries as the flu kills up to 50% of birds infected. As yet, the flu has not spread to Australia but migrating birds could easily bring it here. "Black swans, for instance, are especially vulnerable to all types of avian flu” because of an immune deficiency.

Quammen points the finger at commercial poultry farming as the source of avian flu outbreaks.

Refs: David Quammen, Why Dead Birds Are Falling From the Sky, New York Times, 23 April 2023; Parwinder Kaur, Migrating birds could bring lethal avian flu to Australia’s vulnerable birds, The Conversation, 4 May 2023.